“To use this facility, taxpayers can log into their e-filing account and under their profile page select ‘E-filing Vault – higher security’,” the finance ministry said in a statement.
Taxpayers can select to login into the vault with any one or multiple options of the higher security methods using Aadhaar linkage to generate OTP or login through net-banking or use the Digital Signature Certificate (DSC), it said.
“Using this, taxpayers can prevent anyone from logging in even if in the past they shared their account’s user id and password. The dual factor authorization ensures higher degree of security compared to the simple user id and password,” it said.
Taxpayers can also select how their password can be reset, using the ‘e-filing vault’. Once the taxpayer has selected reset password using the higher security methods, no other person will be able to reset the password even if they know the secret answer or e-filing OTP.
The government said that soon additional options like ATM password, bank account validation or demat account will be introduced for the higher level of security for login as well as resetting of password.
“Income tax Department advises all taxpayers to select the e-filing vault option to add an additional layer of security to their account to login and reset password,” it said.
