Beware of Job Scams

By: James Dicks Click author's name for more of his/her articles

It’s time to be cautious, during these rough economic times, we are facing, an unemployment rate reaching double digits and people are putting themselves in harm’s way. When times are tough people can get desperate, especially if they have lost their job and are out of work. The Internet is allowing predators to prey on these unsuspecting people who are frantically searching for jobs.

The first thing that likely happens when someone loses a job is to hit the Internet and start looking for a new one. In case you haven’t, just go to Google and search for job openings. There are lots of them and surprisingly you would think that with all the jobs out there we wouldn’t have a unemployment crisis. Well the problem lies in the fact the many of these “job postings” are scams.

Most of the scams on the Internet will often look very official and convincing. Major Fortune 500 companies are having their identities threatened too. The thieves are using these companies’ names to make the jobs look official to induce you to send an application to them at their HR email address. If the email address is not the same as the companies’ that’s an obvious RED FLAG. Many of these thieves will use Yahoo, AOL, Gmail instead of a corporate email address; so if you see that watch out. Accomplish your own due diligence.

Be very cautious about trying to find a job completely on line. Make sure you ask the right questions. Many of these job scams are listed as part time work from home type jobs. If the job has anything to do with writing checks, doing payroll or processing of any kind – that’s a RED FLAG. Start asking hard questions, and by the way, don’t just take what the person on the other end of the line has to say as fact. Do your own home work.

First thing you want to do is check the IP address of anyone you are communication with on line. There are lots of places to find out where an IP address comes from, you can try this one; http://www.johnru.com/active-whois/trace-email.html. I don’t endorse it but it has some good information on how to locate the IP address of a computer from someone’s email header so that you can find out where the IP address originates. Most of these scams come from Nigeria, so keep your eyes open and if it sounds too good to be true it just may. Do your home work and never send anyone you don’t know, regardless of the circumstances, any money via wire or Western Union. Once you send it – it’s gone.

Dateline NBC just did a great story called “Inside the Financial Fiascos,” a special on how to see through these scams. If you missed it you can probably catch it online at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032600/ . Just be careful, take your time. Your new job will come but in the meantime don’t fall prey to these scam artists and make your bad situation even worse.

Article Source: ABC Article Directory

About The Author: