IRS Dirty Dozen 2026: What's Actually New
The IRS released its annual Dirty Dozen scam list on Slam the Scam Day. The schemes are familiar. What's new is the explicit warning on AI-generated tax advice: don't use it, and don't trust it.
Every year the IRS publishes its Dirty Dozen — the twelve fraud categories causing the most damage to taxpayers. Every year the names look familiar: phishing, fake charities, employment tax schemes, ghost preparers.
Familiarity is not comfort. These schemes persist because they work, and they're getting harder to detect.
The notable addition to 2026: a direct warning on AI-generated tax advice. The IRS is telling taxpayers not to rely on AI for complex tax questions and to verify any calculations AI provides. The agency has started seeing returns where AI hallucinations generated errors that look like fraud, because on paper they are.
For practical purposes: if you owe the IRS, you'll know because they'll write to you first. Any call demanding immediate payment is not the IRS. The FTC received more than 330,000 government impersonation complaints in 2025 — a 25% increase over the prior year.
- 01Dirty Dozen tax scams for 2026: IRS reminds taxpayers to watch out for dangerous threats— IRS
- 02Dirty Dozen | Internal Revenue Service— IRS
- 03IRS names its 2026 'Dirty Dozen' tax scams— Accounting Today
- 04Here Are the IRS 'Dirty Dozen' Tax Scams for 2026— CPA Practice Advisor