Has anyone noticed that when you try to answer any question pertaining to the IRS stimulus check?

That you cannot answer it. Keep getting a code error 999, and Yahoo states its not their problem, but the users. Yahoo states anti-virus and spyware or my isp provider is the problem.

Yet any other question can be answered, just not any question pertaining to the IRS.

2008-05-10T15:28:55Z

Jennifer, that what I said already, anyone can answer questions except those pertaining to the IRS.

Judy2008-05-10T15:28:59Z

Favorite Answer

There is apparently some limit on the number of times the same link can be posted in a day - and every link to anywhere on the IRS website hits that limit real fast these days. Either put some error in the link and then explain it in the rest of your answer, or just leave out the link, and it'll work fine.

I have reported this to the Answers people several days ago, but get a generic response and no fix.

Bostonian In MO2008-05-10T16:22:01Z

IF you try to post a link to the IRS site, you will get that annoying 999 page. It appears that Yahoo is trying to combat spammers who are posting links to sites outside of Yahoo. My guess is that they allow a certain number of posts to a specific domain and then lock out all further posts for a period of time. The programmers haven't gotten smart enough to exempt domains that are not likely to be "spamvertized" such as the irs.gov domain.

Spamming by scammers is a major problem everywhere. Post a question that includes "Where can I get a loan for xxxx?" and their spams will pop up in the queue within minutes. Some of the scammers have figured out that most folks are not dumb enough any more to e-mail a "loan" company using a Yahoo.com or Gmail.com address so they have put up web links to pages on blogspot.com or similar sites to run their scams.

Your question loosely applies to the IRS and there have been a number of responses to it, and I've posted numerous answers directly related to the IRS and they are never blocked. If I add a link to the IRS website it will be blocked.

Some of the spam postings are posted by virus infected "drones" on the internet controlled by bot-nets. That's probably why Yahoo makes the comment about virus infections on the "999" page.

Whoever gave this the TD rating is either some hateful troll that I've pissed off along the way -- and there are a number of them -- or one of the scam artists themselves.

Edit: It appears to be working again. http://www.irs.gov Yep it is! Only time will tell how long it will stay live though. Sooner or later it will be blocked again.

MarineMom2008-05-10T15:29:32Z

You can actually post a question or answer a question and put things like go to the IRS website, but they quit letting you post the URL link to the stimulus rebate page or any link to the IRS for some reason. I think it's pretty odd but it happened last week sometime. You just have to rephrase your answer without using the links I guess....that's what I've been doing. I don't think it's the users problem either by the way!

Ms. Angel..2008-05-11T18:29:43Z

Yes but I can give answer to 4 or 5 then after that I get the error message.

Steve B2008-05-10T15:34:58Z

That's obviously not true, otherwise there would be no answers posted to questions about the stimulus check. The 999 error seems almost random to me.

Yahoo's statement that it is not their fault strikes me as silly. My ISP's security software is supposed to be protecting me, not Yahho's site.

Show more answers (2)