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Warning Signs For Job Seekers
Jackson Hole Star Tribune
We welcome you to JobBank USA and hope your job hunting experience
is a pleasant one. We hope you find our resources useful.
January 20, 2008
If finding a new job or changing careers is one of your new year’s resolutions, you’re not alone. A 2007 survey by CareerBuilder.com, conducted by Harris Interactive, found that 84 percent of U.S. workers are not in their dream job.
Before you hit the Internet in search of that new job, however, the Better Business Bureau warns that job search fraud is often linked to online identity theft. Job seekers should never divulge personal information over the Internet until they have checked on the company’s reputation and reliability, and are comfortable with the firm’s privacy policies.
Following are two of the most common online employment fraud schemes reported:
-- Payment forwarding or payment transfer. Con artists use information from resumes posted online to convince job seekers that they are legitimate employers, all for the purpose of getting bank account information.
Scammers tell job seekers they need personal account numbers to deliver paychecks by direct deposit. Or they may promise high wages for jobs that involve forwarding, transferring or wiring money from personal bank accounts, PayPal accounts, or from Western Union to another account.
Job seekers, as part of their pay, are told to keep a percentage of the money (which can total hundreds or even thousands of dollars) as payment. The money the victim transfers is invariably stolen, so the job candidate ends up aiding in the theft and committing wire fraud.
-- "Personal" invitations and ID verification. Job scammers send mass e-mails to long lists of recipients. In the e-mail, scammers claim to have seen their resumes on the Internet, note their skills match the requirements for the job, and invite them to complete online job applications.
During the “job application process,” or prior to “scheduling an interview,” con artists will say the business needs to scan driver’s licenses, passports or other means of identification to verify identity.
Or the scammer claims to need bank account or credit card numbers to run a credit check to complete the job application process.
Proceed with caution -- these are not legitimate requests and can be used to commit identity theft.
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