Fuel Surge in Job Scams: The times couldn’t be better for job scammers. Layoffs in the tech and public sectors, coupled with the malicious use of artificial intelligence, are fueling strong growth in fraud aimed at job seekers.
Scams aimed at job seekers can come in a variety of forms, among them:
- Hire and Fire Scams — where a job seeker is quickly hired, works, and is fired before collecting a paycheck.
- Fake Recruiters — where a fraudster harvests sensitive information from a job seeker as part of the application process.
- Pay-to-Work Offers — where job seekers are told they’ve been hired, but they have to make some upfront payments for training or equipment first.
“Asking for money or asking you to buy something with the promise of a refund is a scam that has been around for a long time,” said Julia Tootacre, director of career strategy at Resume Templates.
“These companies appear legitimate and sometimes even have a website, but their goal is to scam people,” she told TechNewsWorld.
“Job seekers need to be on their guard to avoid scams,” she added. “If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.”
Robust Scam Economy
The rise in employment scams is not surprising, as fraudulent activity has become widespread across the globe. “The fraud economy is booming. It’s grown 3,000% year-over-year in some parts of the world,” said Joshua McKenty, CEO and co-founder of Polyguard, a deepfakes and AI fraud protection solutions provider, in New York.
Job seekers in unstable labour markets are attractive to scammers, he continued. “When we see big waves of layoffs, particularly in the tech sector, fraudulent workers become attractive because there are so many job seekers to target,” he told TechNewsWorld.
“The same thing happens when hiring starts to increase,” he said. “A lot of hiring means a lot of targets.” He explained that AI is also fueling the rise of job fraud. “The entire fraud economy is now based on AI, from simple transfers to text messages, emails, and fraudulent job postings that look legitimate.”
AI helps scammers pass the smell test, added Joshua Planos, vice president of marketing for the Better Business Bureau in Lincoln, Nebraska. “For a scammer, that’s the end goal: to make it seem like what you’re offering is real,” he told TechNewsWorld.
“It stands to reason that with how much AI and chatbots are being used for everything from marketing materials to internal documents, it would impact employment or job market scams,” he said.
Why Job Seekers Are Prime Scam Targets
Vulnerable job seekers are also driving scam growth, added Erich Kron, a security awareness advocate at KnowBe4, a security awareness training provider in Clearwater, Fla. “An unstable world economy has created a level of concern for many people, especially when it comes to their employment and personal finances,” he told TechNewsWorld.
“This uncertainty has people who would otherwise not be interested in other employment considering their options,” he continued. “Bad actors know this, and they leverage that fear and uncertainty to meet their goals.”
“A fragile labour market and desperation have created the perfect storm,” added Sam Wright, head of partnerships and operations at Hunter, an online AI-powered resume builder and job search platform.
“Many job seekers apply to dozens of listings a week with little feedback, so when something promising appears, they jump,” he told TechNewsWorld.
AI can contribute to that fear and uncertainty, too. “Many individuals have concerns about AI replacing their roles, so they are more open to possible career changes than in the past,” Kron said. “This concern about career obsolescence is also a tool exploited by bad actors.”
New Workers Targeted by AI-Powered Scams
The rise of remote work and the sensitive data shared by scammers have all contributed to their growth, said Mona Terry, director of operations and head of victim services at the Identity Theft Resource Center in San Diego, a nonprofit that works to minimize the risks and mitigate the impact of identity theft and crime.
Scammers are also targeting first-time job seekers. “Many people are looking to work remotely, and for those who haven’t done it before or are entering the job market with years of experience, the interview process may be new,” Terry told TechNewsWorld.
“Requesting interviews on non-traditional platforms is a red flag for those in the know, but not for the average person,” she explained. “Scammers are asking for information that would traditionally be requested after a hire, such as proof of employment eligibility (Social Security numbers, driver’s licenses, bank account numbers for direct deposit, etc.) before hiring.”
Dean Burner, a data scientist at Revelio Labs, a New York-based job search company, noted that one reason fake job postings and phishing emails work is the vast and growing number of job postings online and the inability of job seekers to research all of the ones that might interest them properly.
“To give you an idea of the scale, at any given time, there are hundreds of millions of job postings in our data, and the likelihood of them leading to an actual hire varies,” he told TechNewsWorld.
“While not scams, the prevalence of phantom job postings contributes to the apparent abundance of opportunities, and they are increasing as economic uncertainty increases,” he said. “For example, the ratio of hires to openings dropped from about 0.75 to less than 0.5 in recent years. This is partly due to a shortage of talent that employers consider truly qualified, and partly because companies want to create the appearance of growth without actually doing so.”
How To Spot and Avoid Employment Scams
For job seekers looking to protect themselves from scammers, Diana Rothfuss, director of global risk, fraud, and compliance strategy solutions at SAS, an artificial intelligence and analytics software company in Cary, North Carolina, recommends checking promising job postings on a job board versus the company website to ensure they are legitimate.
“Only apply through the company website,” she told TechNewsWorld. “Very often, the scammer’s ultimate goal is to collect sensitive particular information that can be used to commit other fraudulent activities, including identity theft.”
“Don’t click on the job posting link,” she warned. “Open the company website in a different browser to ensure you are not being redirected to a phishing site.”
Beware of urgency, warned John Wilson, a senior threat researcher at Fortra, a cybersecurity company in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. “While some jobs may require an urgent candidate, no legitimate company will hire someone who hasn’t passed a background check; they could get into legal trouble, and that takes time,” he told TechNewsWorld.
“Whenever you feel pressured to act rapidly, slow down and do your research,” he said. “Urgency is a well-known persuasive technique for influencing people.”
The best way to avoid these scams is to be wary of unsolicited job offers, advised Paul Farnsworth, president of Dice, a job site for tech and engineering professionals in Centennial, Colorado.
“Always do your due diligence on a company, be wary of any job that needs an upfront payment, and avoid any offers or terms that seem too good to be true,” he told TechNewsWorld. Keep the classic signs of phishing in mind: check for inconsistencies in email domains, don’t share sensitive personal information, and be on the lookout for anything suspicious.
With increasingly intelligent artificial intelligence, economic uncertainty, and the fact that these scams are low-risk and potentially very lucrative for those who perpetrate them, he said, they’re likely to continue and grow.