Last fall, Aaron Perkowitz applied for a job as a technical writer. The hirer asked him to compose a paid test article — and when he finished, requested his banking information, to pay him.
Perkowitz asked why so much information was needed — couldn’t they just mail a check? No response. “The article took me three hours,” he says, “but I’m glad I didn’t fall for their scam.”
Perkowitz got off easy. Today’s scam ads are often indiscernible from legitimate listings, and can appear on reputable job sites like LinkedIn and Indeed, as well as in your inbox as phishing attacks. Other scammers extract money from applicants under the guise of background checks, security clearance, uniforms or training.
It’s a lucrative line of crime: of the 22,325 job scams reported to The Federal Trade Commission in the third quarter of 2022, the median loss was $2,000.
“Employers usually have an easy enough time getting applicants’ addresses, phone numbers and even social security numbers,” says Ben Michael, an attorney at Michael & Associates. “Throw in a bank account or credit card number, ostensibly for direct deposit, and that’s everything you need to commit identity theft.”
If it seems like job scams are surging, it’s not your imagination: they’ve more than doubled since late 2019, FTC data show. Right now, job-hungry populations are being targeted, such as people laid off by tech companies, immigrants seeking jobs (especially for visa requirements) and recent college grads.
The boom in remote jobs allows scammers to advertise positions or companies that don’t necessarily exist. “The jobs are really tempting,” says Rahul Telang, professor of information systems at Carnegie Mellon University. “People really want to believe what they are seeing. If they see a remote job with flexible hours, they typically tend to fall for that.”
Job hoaxes are getting harder to avoid. Just two years ago, reasonably savvy people could spot most…
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