More than two thirds of all federal tax filers now do so electronically, according to newly-released Internal Revenue Service figures.

During 2010, when filing returns for the previous year, 69.76 of filers sent their returns to the tax agency electronically.

"IRS e-file is no longer the exception; now it is the norm," an IRS press release states. In 2001, just 30.73 of all filers submitted an electronic return.

In terms of raw numbers, the number of electronically filed returns filed this year is a 145 percent increase from 2001, when 40,244,000 returns were digital. This year, 98,740,000 returns were digital. During that same period, the number of all filed tax returns increased by about 8 percent.

The IRS is a champion of electronic filing, not in the least because processing an electronically filed return costs the agency $0.35 per return while processing a paper return costs $2.87 per return, according to IRS figures in a 2009 Government Accountability Office report.

Electronic returns also tend to be more accurate than paper-returns, thanks mostly to error-checking by tax-preparation software.

Almost 35 million of 2010 returns came from a home computer, up 8 percent from last years, IRS figures show.

For More:
- go to the IRS release

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