King County has received calls from people and businesses within and outside of the county, including individuals from other states and countries, who have reported receiving false confirmation of an online property tax payment made through the King County e-commerce system.

These e-mails were not sent by King County and the county’s e-commerce system has not been compromised.

“It appears that someone copied our standard payment confirmation email and altered the header in the e-mail so that it appears to be from King County,” said county Chief Information Officer Bill Kehoe. “These messages did not come from King County and the recipients have not made any payments with us.”

Kehoe added that King County’s e-commerce system is safe.

“We have robust protections on all of our information technology systems,” he said. “The e-mail addresses did not come from our database. Residents can rest easy, knowing that their personal information is secure.”

King County encourages everyone to practice safe computing habits. If you have not made a King County tax payment via the online system, but received an e-mail notification from KingCountyEcommerce@kingcounty.gov, delete it and do not open any attachments.

King County will also post a message on the property tax payment website warning the public about this situation.