February 8, 2026

Tax Season Scams Are Starting Early. Here's the One That Hits Small Businesses First

It's February. Tax season is ramping up. Your accountant’s calendar is filling fast. Your bookkeeper is gathering documents. Everyone’s thinking about W-2s, 1099s, and deadlines.

Here’s the part nobody schedules: the first real tax-season problem usually isn’t a form.

It’s a scam.

And there’s one that shows up long before April because it’s easy, believable, and aimed squarely at small businesses. You might already have it sitting in someone’s inbox.

The W-2 Scam: How It Works

Here’s the setup:

Someone inside your company—usually whoever handles payroll or HR—receives an email that appears to come from the CEO, owner, or a senior executive.

The message is short. Polite. Urgent.

“Hey, I need copies of all employee W-2s for a meeting with the accountant. Can you send them over ASAP? I’m slammed today.”

It looks normal. The tone feels right. Tax season is busy, so the urgency doesn’t feel suspicious. And the request itself sounds completely reasonable.

So the employee sends the W-2s.

Except the email wasn’t from the CEO.

It was from a criminal using a spoofed address or a look-alike domain.

And now that criminal has every employee’s:

  • Full legal name

  • Social Security number

  • Home address

  • Salary information

Everything needed for identity theft. Everything needed to file fraudulent tax returns before your employees do.

What Happens Next

This is usually how businesses discover the problem:

An employee files their tax return. It gets rejected.

“Return already filed for this Social Security number.”

Someone already filed in their name. Already claimed the refund. Already got paid.

Now that employee is dealing with the IRS, credit monitoring, identity-theft protection, and months of paperwork—all because of a document they didn’t even know had been sent.

Multiply that by your entire payroll.

Now imagine explaining to your team that their personal information was compromised because someone trusted what looked like a routine email.

That’s not just a security issue.
That’s a trust issue.
An HR nightmare.
A potential lawsuit.
A reputation hit that doesn’t go away quickly.

Why This Scam Works So Well

This isn’t a sloppy scam email filled with spelling errors.

It works because:

The timing is perfect. W-2 requests are normal in February. No one questions why someone would ask for them right now.

The request is reasonable. It’s not “wire $50,000” or “buy gift cards.” It’s something that actually gets shared during tax season.

The urgency feels natural. “I’m slammed today—can you send this quick?” sounds like every executive in February.

The sender looks legitimate. Criminals research their targets. They know the CEO’s name. Sometimes they know your accountant’s name. The email looks real because it was built to look real.

Employees want to be helpful. Especially when the request appears to come from the boss. Urgency overrides verification.

How to Protect Your Business (Before This Lands)

The good news: this scam is completely preventable—and it has more to do with policy and culture than expensive technology.

Make a “no W-2s via email” rule. Period. No exceptions. Sensitive payroll documents never leave the company through email attachments. If someone asks for them via email, the answer is “no,” even if it appears to be the CEO.

Verify sensitive requests using a second channel. A phone call. An in-person conversation. A chat message. Anything other than replying to the email. Use a phone number you already trust—not one included in the message. Thirty seconds of verification can save months of damage control.

Hold a 10-minute tax-scam huddle now. Not later. Not “closer to April.” Tell payroll and HR: “These scams are coming. This is what they look like. This is what we do.” Awareness is the cheapest security investment you’ll ever make.

Lock down payroll and HR systems. Multi-factor authentication (MFA) should be enabled anywhere employee data lives. If credentials are phished, MFA is the last door standing.

Make verification a culture—not a burden. An employee who double-checks a request from the CEO should be praised, not made to feel awkward. When questioning is encouraged, scams lose their power.

That’s it. Five rules. Simple to implement this week. Strong enough to stop the first wave.

The Bigger Picture

The W-2 scam is just the opening act.

Between now and April, expect a surge of tax-themed attacks:

  • Fake IRS notices demanding immediate payment

  • Phishing emails posing as tax-software updates

  • Spoofed messages from “your accountant” with malicious links

  • Fraudulent invoices timed to look like tax-related expenses

Criminals love tax season because everyone is distracted, moving fast, and handling sensitive financial requests that don’t feel unusual.

Businesses that make it through tax season clean aren’t luckier.

They’re prepared.

They have policies.
They train their people.
They have systems that catch suspicious requests before they become disasters.

Is Your Business Ready?

If you already have policies in place and your team knows what to watch for, great—you’re ahead of most small businesses.

If not, now is the time. Not after the first scam hits.

If this sounds like your business, book a 15-minute Tax Season Security Check.

We’ll review:

  • Payroll and HR access controls and MFA

  • Your W-2 verification process

  • Email protections that stop spoofed messages

  • The one policy gap most businesses overlook

If this doesn’t sound like you, that’s excellent. But you probably know a business owner it does describe. Forward them this article—it could save them a very expensive headache.

Book your 15-minute Tax Season Security Check

Because tax season is stressful enough without identity theft on top of it.