Stimulus payments, intended to help those struggling due to the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, started reaching Americans last week. The Treasury Department and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) expected up to 80 million Americans to receive their payments via direct deposit by April 15, with paper checks being mailed starting next week. While millions are awaiting their payments to help with necessities, landlords are also eager for their tenants to receive stimulus checks, so they can pay rent. Unfortunately, some landlords have not just been waiting patiently; instead, some appear to be resorting to illegal tactics to learn when their tenants are receiving their payments in order to pressure them to pay.

What Are Some Landlords Allegedly Doing On IRS Get My Payments Portal?

In order to help Americans to track the status of their stimulus payments, the IRS and Treasury Department launched a new tool, Get My Payment. The tool provides individuals “with the status of your payment, including the date your payment is scheduled to be deposited into your bank account or mailed.” While the rollout of the portal has had its issues, including confusing error messages telling users, “Payment Status Not Available,” it has also helped many understand the date their payment is scheduled to be deposited into their bank account.

In order to check the status of a stimulus payment, one only needs to provide basic information, including name, date of birth, street address, and Social Security Number (SSN).

This basic information is readily available on the dark web thanks to data breaches like Equifax, where the personal information of 145 million Americans was exposed. It is also readily available to many landlords through the applications that tenants complete when applying to rent a property. While knowing someone’s payment status may not help a criminal steal funds, it could certainly help landlords. Some of them appear to be accessing this information illegally, impersonating tenants to check the status of their stimulus payments and then harassing them to pay their rent.

One Twitter user, Joshua Browder, showed an example of an alleged text exchange between a landlord and tenant, showing just how easy it is to abuse the IRS’ “Get My Payment” portal:

(Updated: According to a Facebook post, the property management company is in Forest Grove, Oregon and the tenant in the case is Austin Goodrich. Mr. Goodrich released a statement on the incident, highlighting what he calls, “the IRS’s failure to provide Americans with a secure system to check the status of stimulus payments.”)

Other uses posted photos that included similar claims.

Before gaining access to the IRS portal, users have to click through and acknowledge that use of the system is for authorized use only. The warning states, “unauthorized use of this system is prohibited and subject to criminal and civil penalties, including all penalties applicable to willful unauthorized access (UNAX) or inspection of taxpayer records.” Inputting someone else’s personal information to check the status of a stimulus payments doesn’t qualify as “authorized use,” and is illegal.

What Should You Do If Your Landlord Checks Your Stimulus Check Status?

You may want to speak with a lawyer to evaluate options if your landlord checks your payment status on the IRS portal. You may also want to consider filing a police report.

What Else Should I Know?

There is no data to contextualize how widespread this illegal tactic is. Presumably, some landlords may do this without being as brazen and admitting to it in a text thread; however, it may also be a few bad apples and not a rotten barrel. There have been many heartwarming examples of landlords who have stepped up to support their tenants during the crisis. One, Matt Salerno, forgave April’s rent for 200 – 300 tenants in his 18 rental buildings. As landlords and tenants navigate the uncertain future, they will surely need to stay in close contact; however impersonating tenants and spying on their stimulus check status should not be tolerated.

via: https://www.forbes.com/sites/shaharziv/2020/04/19/some-landlords-are-illegally-spying-on-tenants-stimulus-check-status/#23ee3f3925fd

Photo Credit: forbes.com

In France, where prostitution is partly criminalised, it is illegal to buy sexual services but legal for a woman or a man to sell sex. And anyone selling sex must pay taxes like everyone else. But many people in prostitution – some of whom consider themselves “sex workers” and therefore believe they should be entitled to workers’ rights and protection – are not currently eligible for state income support, despite seeing their income disappear as a result of the nationwide COVID-19 lockdown.

Sex-worker organisations are now calling on the government to create an emergency fund to help the most vulnerable among their number survive the crisis. Understanding France’s current prostitution policy helps to explain why it is unlikely the state will agree.

Like many countries, France has introduced unprecedented measures to combat the spread of Covid-19: citizens are required to stay indoors and avoid social contact, and all non-essential businesses have either closed or switched to working from home. For people in prostitution, these new rules have led to a significant loss of income as sex workers and their clients isolate at home.

In 2016 a law was introduced that banned the purchase but not the sale of sexual services. The law was designed to signal the state’s belief that prostitution is a form of violence against women and contrary to human dignity.

But community health groups have criticised the law for increasing the stigma around and vulnerability of those working in prostitution. They argue that sex workers, and especially those who are particularly vulnerable, such as undocumented migrants and people struggling with substance abuse, have had to adopt increasingly unsafe working practices in order to survive. Competing for fewer clients, some of whom demand risky conditions such as unprotected sex, makes people more vulnerable. Having to hide from the police to protect their clients also exposes sex workers to increased violence.

Recently, aid organisations have highlighted the escalating insecurity experienced by sex workers unable to work because of the new confinement measures. Reports have emerged of sex workers being evicted from their homes because they cannot afford rent, and fewer vulnerable people are reaching out to community health organisations for food or medical help. It is not a problem specific to France and similar situations have been reported around the world, including the UK.

Shadow workers

In response to the COVID-19 lockdown, the state has agreed to subsidise up to 84% of employees’ wages, and has introduced a €1,500 per month grant for the self-employed. Sex workers who have the right to live and work in France and are registered as self-employed may be able to apply to these schemes.

However, anybody working illegally, in what is referred to as the “underground” or “shadow” economy, is excluded from workers’ benefits, including income support, despite being required to pay tax. In France, everybody who earns money through legal and illegal means has to pay tax. However, only those who work legally get workers’ benefits – including the new COVID-19 income support.

It’s a paradox: everybody works, everybody pays tax (in theory), but only some get workers rights and protection. In the current situation, anybody in the underground economy loses their work but get no benefits. This means that all mitigation measures introduced to help people with their income during lockdown are useless to part of the population.

The issue being raised by activist groups is that this will push vulnerable sex workers to continue working to earn money and put public health measures at risk since they cannot access income support. These organisations argue that setting up an emergency fund for people in this position would ensure that they can stay at home and self isolate without becoming destitute.

Although exact numbers are hard to determine, there are an estimated 30,000 people involved in prostitution in France, of which 93% are believed to be foreigners (documented or not), and many of whom are vulnerable and unable to draw on government support.

Community health groups and sex-worker organisations have begun fundraising to help out those most in need. They have also written to French President Emmanuel Macron for emergency funds to support sex workers during the lockdown as these organisations are unable to meet the demand for their help.

MPs have also written to the Marlène Schiappa, secretary of state for gender equality, to highlight the plight of sex workers during the crisis. All argue that state support is vital to ensuring that vulnerable people are not forced out of confinement to earn money, putting themselves and others at risk.

Prostitution policy

So far, the government has refused to provide special assistance to these sex workers. Schiappa has stated that it would be “very complicated” for the state to compensate individuals working illegally, including undeclared sex workers. Since the end of World War II, the French government considers all those working in prostitution (overwhelmingly presumed to be women) as victims of exploitation in need of rescue and rehabilitation, and only steps in to help those willing to leave prostitution.

The state supports people wishing to stop selling sex via a programme of social and financial aid delivered through accredited charities and women’s rights organisations. But recent research reveals this support package remains underfunded and unevenly applied. It has also been criticised for helping fewer than 100 people per year exit prostitution since the programme was introduced in 2017.

If the French state maintains its current policy position, it is unlikely to compensate vulnerable sex workers for lost income if they are unwilling or unable to leave prostitution. Instead it will continue to direct people towards its exit programme or charitable organisations for support. Yet policies that do not address sex workers’ welfare needs, or those of people subsisting in the “shadow” economy more generally, are likely to endanger lives and undermine the wider public health measures aimed at stemming the epidemic.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

via: https://currently.att.yahoo.com/news/coronavirus-why-french-sex-workers-153556757.html

Photo Credit: currently.att.yahoo.com

Heads up, consumers: When running the essential errand that is grocery shopping during the coronavirus epidemic in the U.S., there’s no need to wipe down the food packaging after you’ve returned home, according to a federal agency.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) attempted to quell Americans’ fears that their food packaging may be contaminated with the novel coronavirus, as recent studies have suggested it can live on certain surfaces between hours and days.

But in a statement posted to its website on Thursday, the FDA said: “We want to reassure consumers that there is currently no evidence of human or animal food or food packaging being associated with transmission of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.”

“This particular coronavirus causes respiratory illness and is spread from person-to-person, unlike foodborne gastrointestinal or GI viruses, such as norovirus and hepatitis A that often make people ill through contaminated food,” it added, noting there are currently no nationwide shortages of food, though some stores may be out of certain products.

The FDA also provided tips on how to protect yourself, other shoppers and store employees when buying essential items. For instance, it advised to:

• Prepare a grocery list in advance
• Wear a face mask or covering while in the store (this is in line with recently updated Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC] guidelines, and is now mandatory in hot spots like New York)
• Practice social distancing while shopping, make sure to stay at least 6 feet away from others
• Thoroughly wash your hands after returning home and again after putting the groceries away

“Again, there is no evidence of food packaging being associated with the transmission of COVID-19. However, if you wish, you can wipe down product packaging and allow it to air dry, as an extra precaution,” the FDA added.

via: https://nypost.com/2020/04/17/no-need-to-wipe-down-food-packaging-during-coronavirus-pandemic-fda-says/

Photo Credit: Taidgh Barron

Note to the wise: If you’re ever attacked by a crocodile — stick your fingers up its nose.

A mother in Zimbabwe rescued her toddler from a killer croc this week by jamming her fingers up the reptile’s nose.

Maurina Musisinyana, 30, had left her two children playing under an umbrella on the bank of the Runde River while she went fishing nearby when she heard a scream and saw her son Gideon being dragged away by the huge reptile.

Musisinyana jumped on the beast and used her fingers to block its nose, forcing it to release its grip on the boy, according to the Mirror. During the encounter, she was bitten on the hand.

“I pressed its nose hard, a tip I learnt from the elders long back, Musisinyana, from Chihosi village, told the paper.

“If you ­suffocate a crocodile from its nose, it loses its strength and that is exactly what I did. I used my other arm to free my baby’s head from its jaws. Even to this day, I still do not believe I rescued my son.”

Gideon was taken to a nearby hospital and has since made a full recovery.

via: https://nypost.com/2020/04/18/mom-saves-toddler-from-crocodile-by-sticking-fingers-up-reptiles-nose/

Photo Credit: nypost.com