Home › Guides

Guides to job scams and fake job offers

How to spot a fake job ad, a fake recruiter or a request for money dressed up as a job offer. Practical guides with (made-up) example messages and what to do if you fell for one.

• Paid to like videos? How the task scam works and how to spot itThe work-from-home gig that pays you to like videos, then asks you to “top up” to unlock your earnings.
• Recruiter on WhatsApp or Telegram: is it a scam?Not every recruiter in your DMs is a scammer, but some signs are unmistakable. Here is how to tell them apart.
• Asked to pay before you start a job? Signs of a fake job offerTraining fees, starter kits, background checks: when a job asks you for money first, something is wrong.
• How to verify a company before a job interviewBusiness registry, email domain, careers page and office address: what to check before you show up for an interview.
• Jobs that pay you to move money or reship packages: the money mule trapRemote jobs that pass money through your bank account or have you reship parcels: the person who says yes ends up holding the risk.
• Recruiter asking you to download a file, install an app or log in through a link? Stop and checkAttachments, fake portals, interview apps and coding tests: when the hiring process is really a way to get something onto your device or take over an account.
• Asked for your ID, Social Security number or a verification code “for onboarding”? What employers really need, and whenA selfie with your ID, your SSN, a code sent to your phone: what a real employer needs from you, when, and which requests are identity theft.
• Overseas job offers: fake agencies, visa fees, flights and housing you have to pay forVisa, flight, housing deposit, “processing fee”: when a job abroad wants money before you leave, and the offers that hide something worse.
• Resume rewrite, financed training, paid photo shoot: when a job offer is really a sales pitchYour resume “won't pass the system”, the course comes with a loan, the photos must be taken by their photographer: when the job is the bait and you are the customer.
• Paid to keep laptops running at home or install a bandwidth app? What's really going onHosting strangers' laptops, leaving a PC on with remote access, “renting out” your connection: easy gigs where the tool being used is you.
• You paid or gave your details to a fake job offer: what to do nowBank, evidence, passwords, credit freeze, reporting: the order to act in if you already paid or sent documents, with US and UK steps and what you can realistically recover.
• Ghost jobs: how to spot listings with no real opening and protect your résuméThe listing stays up for months and nobody replies: why some jobs never get filled, when that becomes a scam, and how to get your résumé back out of a database.