Ever fill out a job application online and not hear anything at all? Was it it strictly a matter of the job being filled? Not necessarily. You may be the target of a company playing fun and games with the recession and your filling out the application could have some unpleasant consquences. DarkSyde in The Daily Kos has a fascinating piece on this. Here’s the introduction:
You’re looking for a job like millions of people these days and check all the big boards. Viola, you see a position advertised that fits your qualifications like a glove with a local company you may know! Maybe you take the time to fill out the laborious application, send it on its way confident that, finally, you might be in the running. But hours turn into days, a week goes by, and you don’t hear a peep. Wondering if the position has already been filled, you check the board again and discover to your surprise the job is still listed.
Over time as you navigate other sites and other geographic regions, you see what looks like the same job with same company, the ad never goes away, but you get no response at all, queries go unanswered, or at best you get a form email thanking you for the interest stating the company has gone with candidates who better fit their needs. What in the heck is going on here? Simple, the company is legit, but the job listed was a 100 percent bona-fide fake intentionally put up by that firm.
Follow below and we’ll discuss why companies do this and how the simple, good faith act of applying for it could screw you up in a bunch of different ways.
Go to THIS LINK and read it all.
These are folks basically taking advantage of the recession to complete their own agendas. There are lots of scams out there including jobs that ask you to pay some costs going into them — a loud alarm bell.
Like everything on the internet: what you see is not necessarily what you get — or what you’re dealing with.
There are many scams that involve fake job listings. With a fake job scam, a scammer lists a job, but the job doesn’t really exist.
The scammer uses the job listing to get job seekers to provide personal information including their social security number, credit card information, and/or bank account information. The information is then used to access your bank account or your credit cards and/or to steal your identity.In addition, fake job scams often attempt to get job seekers to wire money from their bank, send money via Western Union or otherwise send money to the scammer.
Some of these job scams were on Craigslist. However, Craigslist isn’t the only job site where there are scam job postings or where your email address may be collected in order to attempt to scam you.
Hcareers five tips to avoid fake job postings.
Jobacle has a must read-piece on this issue. Here’s a short excerpt from this article that needs to be read in full. Part of its explanation why fake job listings are posted:
– Fake job postings exist so that employers can gauge the current talent pool. What better way to assess how in-demand a position is than to post an advertisement to fill that same position? The number of applications can be a valuable pointer on what to pay a person for a given job. It also is an indicator of how easy that person is to potentially replace.
….- Fake job postings exist so that people can add you to a list. It’s unscrupulous, but I know for a fact that in some cases, gigs I have applied for, have led to nothing more than getting my email address added to some spammy email distribution list. Some job postings exist to merely target consumers for specific products and services. Lame.
– Fake job postings exist so that criminals can thrive. This is the lowest of the low, actual thieves who are looking to cull information about you so they can swipe your identity or engage in deviant behavior that involves your good name. This is one reason why it’s not a bad idea to hold back on your personal information on an initial cover letter and resume.
– Fake job postings exist so that people can copy you. Resume plagiarism is prevalent. You need only search “resume template” or a variation to see the thousands of samples floating around on the Web. Some shady cats have been known to take to sites like Craigslist and post a phony job within their field. This gives them access to dozens of resume that they can copy at will and make their own. It also earns them a place in career hell.
Also GO HERE to find 20 ways to identify fake job scams on Craig’s list.
graphic via shutterstock.com
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.