If You Love (or Even Mildly Like) Yourself, Get an IP PIN
Hi Friendos,
Today is another newsletter about Identity Protection PINs that are issued by the IRS. I’ve written about them before, but today can provide some quantitative insight into just how important they are.
As I wrote last year: It’s a 6-digit number that is known only to you and to the IRS. Having an IP PIN is optional but I recommend it. Each year you get an IP PIN that is valid for that calendar year. You only need to opt in to the program once and then will be assigned a fresh IP PIN every year.
Imagine someone else files a false tax return using your Social Security Number and has a tax refund sent to their bank account. If you have an IP PIN that the thief doesn’t know about, the IRS will reject any tax return without the IP PIN. Refund thieves, foiled! On the other hand, if you don’t have an IP PIN and the IRS processes the false return, you are left with a big mess to clean up, including not getting any actual tax refund.
Here is how long the IRS takes to process identity theft cases, according to the Taxpayer Advocate (average processing times):
- 2023: nearly 19 months
- 2024: over 22 months
- 2025: 21 months
This has been on the top 10 “Most Serious Problems” list since 2023 and you can see things are not getting better. The severe staffing cuts at the IRS in 2025 will almost certainly exacerbate things. At the end of its 2025 fiscal year, the IRS had an inventory of approximately 316,000 unresolved identity theft cases.
Please, please, please! Go get yourself an IP PIN. Do it now! Go to this IRS website and follow the instructions: https://www.irs.gov/identity-theft-fraud-scams/get-an-identity-protection-pin
If you need more convincing, or a little more overview of the process, read my newsletter from last January.
Lova ya,
-Stephanie
Frequently Taxed Questions 