Job Hunting: Another SCAM?! Fake job posting!

Anyone can clone someone else's profile on LinkedIn, then change it a little. 

Anyone can register a domain that "sounds like" an existing domain, or as we've highlighted before, claim to be a company that hadn't existed for 10+ years with a website contain false information. 

Armed with both, they can then post fake jobs on LinkedIn. 

Why? I have no idea. What would they do with all those resumes? Offer them fake opportunities? Like someone tried on me?  

But it's clear I ran into another scam, this time on LinkedIn. But let me start from the beginning. 

I was browsing for jobs when LinkedIn found this "Customer Service Representative" remote job listing. 

Screenshot of the fake job listing, did you spot the red flags? 

I have 6 out of 10 skills, yeah! But something nagged at me in the back of my brain... Something is "off" about this job listing. And I don't mean "cara jacobsen". Yes, that's how it's written... all lower case.

What's the first thing that caught your attention with the job listing itself? 

The post has horrible grammar ("a upbeat"), capitalization ("Customer service Rep"), and missing punctuation marks ("customers concerns"). And that's within the first sentence! 

But that wasn't what caught my eye. It's the mismatching company name. Did you see that the job listing was for the company "Empowered Build Inc", but "cara" works at Empowered build LLC"? (bad capitalization AGAIN?)

This job supposedly pays from $20-$43 per hour, just for customer service work! That's way too high. 

So what sort of profile does Ms "cara jacobsen" have? More red flags. 

Screenshot of potentially fake profile (from video)

The logo looks like it's done in MS Paint by a kindergartener. And she ONLY has 2 connections and 7 followers (probably from those 100+ people who applied). She had NO activity on LinkedIn. She allegedly lives in Shingle Springs, which is Central California, 100+ miles east-northeast of San Francisco. 

What can we find about "Empowered build LLC"? There's a website at www.empoweredbuild.net that matches, that claimed to be founded in 2012 "delivering top notch construction solutions". Yet if you go to the website, and scroll to the very bottom... it's based in CANADA?!

Empowered Build LLC gave a 579 area code, which is Quebec, Canada. 

Given the job listing mentioned construction equipment rental customers, does it even MAKE SENSE for anyone in the US to be renting equipment from a Canadian company? 

But there's more... When we explore the "team" at this Empoweredbuild.net, we found "Cara Jacobsen"... with a completely different photo. 

So who's the "real" Cara Jacobsen? Left is LinkedIn, and right is website. 
Screenshot of video expose

As I explore this "website", I came across the "team" page, giving 6 different people, supposedly employees of the company. Except this Cara Jacobsen (capitalized correctly) is clearly NOT the "cara jacobsen" on LinkedIn, despite same name (sorta) and same employer. Hmmm...

Google Reverse Image Search found no match for the left Cara, but it did find a match for the right Cara... on LinkedIn. 

This Cara has 149 connections and 170+ followers. 
The other "cara jacobsen" is very likely a clone of this one. 

But let's compare the two Cara's employment history, as given to LinkedIn... 

Exactly the same period of employment, hmmm...
then "cara" learned NO skills in HR and Insurance fields? 

When you combine this with the fact that "Cara J" has well over 100 connections and followers, and "cara jacobsen" has only a handful, it's pretty conclusive that "cara jacobsen" is a cloned profile. Which means the company is fake, and the job listing is fake as well. 

And let's just say of the 5 remaining photos on the "team", one of them is practically a stock photo. (Try Google Reverse Image search the bottom right, the African-American girl)

So I reported this job listing. 

Within 90 minutes, LinkedIn deleted the job listing. By the time I finished the video, the job listing no longer exists. 

Here's the video if you prefer to watch that: 

Don't get scammed out there, unlike the 100+ people who applied to this fake job. 

Scam? Or... just a way to sell you a service of dubious value?

Scammers are not stupid, and some of the scams can get pretty elaborate. With the economy in the tanks, and people looking for jobs, there's a growing "market" for scams against jobseekers. 

I don't know if this is one of them, but I have seen a similar scam before that did not involve a job. So, read on, and at the end, you tell me, is this likely to be a scam? But let me start from the beginning... 

Photo by Microsoft 365 on Unsplash

I was looking for a technical support position on LinkedIn when I came across this listing by a recruiter, allegedly recruiting for a top law firm with a large tech budget. The requirements are quite soft. In fact, it didn't even list "years of experience required" or any certification. I'm on the west coast, but this recruiter... is on the east coast? Well, it's not impossible... And the LinkedIn listing clearly says "SF Bay Area On-site"... 

So I hit apply, mainly out of curiosity. And I'm at the recruiter's website. And there's the position... Except it's for New York Metro Area. Huh?  

There's an upload resume button, which loads your resume to be parse with their ATS (applicant tracking software). That's fine, every recruiter has that. But right below that, is a button that claims to "AI Match your resume". 

So I clicked it. As I wondered what's that button doing there. 

It sent me to another website, where it claimed my resume is deficient in half of the categories they rate (in fact, my resume allegedly scored 0/0/5/5 where a full score is 5/5/5/5), and for a fee (of SEVERAL HUNDRED dollars), it will rewrite the the resume for me using AI to make sure I cover all the keywords. 

I looked at the ad again, there are no requirements, no expected duties, no "what you bring to the table". So how did this resume analysis software even came up with this rating for my resume, if there are no requirements in the ad? 

And what kind of recruiter puts TWO BUTTONS on every alleged job page that sends prospective candidates to that service, possibly pocketing money at every one who coughed up the dough? 

Minutes after I clicked away, decided not only I don't like this service, I can't afford it anyway, an email appeared in my inbox... The inbox attached to my job hunting email address... and nowhere else. Not only they "scanned" my resume, they are now spamming me with it. "This is the resume review you requested" yeah, sure. 

So I hit UNSUBSCRIBE. 

What do you mean I have to enter my email address again? WTF? 

For that, they are marked as spam. 

Then I reported the listing to to LinkedIn. 

And they acted upon it. 

No, I am NOT going to tell you what they did. This is NOT a name and shame session. 

The point is actually much simpler. If you don't feel comfortable, STOP! You often notice something wrong BEFORE you can verbalize or reason out what's wrong with it. 

Don't get scammed out there. 

Why Do People use Pictures Not of Them in Social Profiles Any Way?

People are picking pictures of criminals, porn stars, and so on, as their social media profile pix.

Don't they know they look stupid doing so?

http://hubpages.com/hub/How-to-choose-your-Profile-Photo-for-Social-Media-a-list-of-dos-and-do-not-dos

Hilarious Exchange: some moron thinks lying on LinkedIn is a right

LinkVaark loves highlighting the morons who put up fake pictures (actors, actresses, models, etc.) as their profile pix. Recently, he found a real gem... Someone put up picture of a doll, really, a high-end display doll.

Then apparently this moron start posting comments asking the pix to be removed, then claimed "that doesn't mean the profile's a fake! There's nothing against it!"  Clearly, the guy didn't read LinkedIn rules...  Below is a shortened version.

Read the whole thing (and see the actual picture that caused the hilarity) over at Linkvarrk:

http://linkvaark.com/2011/06/16/linkedin-fake-profile-mucho-bizarro/#comments

How to spot fake profiles on LinkedIn

Five areas of problems that would indicate a fake profile (or a badly written one)

Photo Problems

Photo problems are with the profile photo itself. 

• Photos that seem to be way too professional... or UN-professional
  
  Photos that are too "posed" are clearly suspect. Use TinEye.com on it and you can often find where it was lifted from. 
  
  ex: that photo of "Jessica Trot" to the right... Is that a pose a professional would show people? TinEye revealed that this is actually an amateur model in Russia who's not afraid to show a bit more skin than that picture.

• Obvious Stock Photo
  
  I've seen profile pics that still have the stockphoto website watermark
  
• Clearly implausible photo
  
  ex: Julia Cute claims to be from Pakistan, but "her" picture is obviously Chinese
  
• Obvious Star Photo
  
  Many fake profiles used movie stars, TV stars, sports stars, and more

Read the whole thing at

http://hubpages.com/hub/How-to-spot-fake-profiles-on-LinkedIn-and-other-social-networking-sites

Related articles

• Fake Facebook Profiles Impersonate 7-Year Old (allfacebook.com)
• Ways to Improve Your LinkedIn Profile (brighthub.com)

Fake Profiles in Online Services

Fake Profiles are all over the Internet. It is almost expected if that half the profiles online are fakes. Facebook? Fake. Match.com? Almost certainly fake.

But LinkedIn profiles? Where professionals go to get networked? Plenty of fakes there too.

Linkvarrk.com have found and busted quite a few fakes, where fakers borrowed photos from other websites to create fake employees for (their own?) firms and such or just put up fake pictures.

And it's amazing how easy it is to find fakes now... If you just use TinEye the image search engine.

Here's one example: Susan Burgos on LinkedIn

http://linkvaark.com/2010/12/05/meet-susan-burgos-angel-johns-mentor/#comments

(borrowing this screenshot from Linkvaark)

Except that's a picture of a makeup artist called Petra Strand

http://www.beautyinthebag.com/wordpress/beauty-gurus/brand-pioneers/petra-strand-pixi/

Can you say... BUSTED?!

Related articles

• "Persona management": how automated fake profiles threaten the heart of online community (robcottingham.ca)