Up to 100,000 People Affected by Student Loan Breach

With tax day around the corner, the last thing you probably want to read about is an IRS breach. Unfortunately, thousands of people are dealing with the grim scenario.

The IRS says up to 100,000 people may be affected by a student loan breach. According to Forbes, the data may have been compromised by hackers targeting the Data Retrieval Tool (DRT). The DRT allows student loan applicants to transfer data from their tax return directly to the federal student aid application form and avoid the hassle of manually inputting data.

Although the investigation is still underway, the IRS is notifying those who are potentially affected. Information including names, birthdates and Social Security numbers may have been breached, according to the IRS.  

Recently, the IRS warned taxpayers to be on the lookout for possible phishing scams during tax season. Learn more about the scam here, and brush up on your skills on how to avoid a phishing email.