Work at Home Scams Part V!

 

Work-at-Home Scams:

How does it work?

Modern Twist to Old Scams

With the rise of the Internet and e-mail, getting a phony ad or message out to a vast audience is cheap and easy. Even though the old work-at-home scams have taken on a modern twist, the typical profile of victims who are most susceptible to these scams has changed very little. Work-at-home con artists have always preyed most heavily upon senior citizens, the disabled, mothers who want to stay at home with their children, people with low income and few job skills, and people who just want to get rich quick.


Cyberspace is simply the newest arena that scam artists have entered to widen their hunt for more people to dupe. To avoid falling for work-at-home scams, both on- and off-line, look for the following warning signs:

-  Overstated claims of product effectiveness;
-  Exaggerated claims of potential earnings, profits, or part-time earnings;
-  Claims of "inside" information;
-  Requirements of money for instructions or products before telling you how the plan works;
-  Claims of "no experience necessary."


Warning List

Beware of falling prey to tempting work-at-home promotions that offer "easy money." You could be at risk for some very bad consequences.


You can:

-  LOSE MONEY!
Consumers have lost amounts ranging from $10 to $70,000, or more.
-  WASTE VALUABLE TIME!
You may throw away countless hours on worthless projects that cost you a lot of money to attempt and complete, but, in the end, give you nothing in return.
-  RUIN YOUR REPUTATION!
You can involuntarily sell your customers terrible quality merchandise or nonexistent products and services.
-  BE A TARGET OF LEGAL ACTION!
You can be held liable for perpetrating a fraud by deliberately or even unintentionally promoting and selling fraudulent products or services to others.


HOW DOES IT WORK?

The scammer places a want ad on the Internet or in newspapers and magazines. The ad describes that a foreign company needs a US representative to process payments for their US clients.


A job seeker responds to the job offer, however he or she becomes aware of it, through the email address provided by the scammer.


The so-called employer (scamployer) provides any number of excuses for not being able to process payments in the company's country. The reason this scam is so successful is that the scamployer claims to be in located in a country that Americans naturally associate either with repression, or recovering from the breakup of the USSR, or not as sophisticated as the US, or generally in a state of governmental and banking disarray.


The victim is asked to respond to the employment notice by submitting a resume to an email address. The requested information often includes full name, address, sex, telephone-cell-fax, bank account number, copy of Driver's License or Passport, and occasionally a Social Security Number.


NOTE: During the string of correspondence between the scamployer and the job seeker victim, malware in the form of spyware and Trojans horses is inserted into the scamployer emails. The malware reports back to the Hacker who then has free access to the job seeker victim's computer, including usernames, passwords, and all personal emails. Personal information from these emails may be applied at a later date for extortion and threat letters to the job seeker victim to make the victim feel he or she is in imminent danger.


In turn, the scamployer emails back an employment contract that ranges from the simple to the very sophisticated. Some contracts are almost non-existent in their brevity, while others are lengthy and have been flat out stolen from other contracts easily viewed or available on the Internet. Since the scammers are not using any real names or addresses and are basing their actions on intent to defraud, the contract is worthless.


The entire employment process is designed to take advantage of the job seeker's ignorance of banking, laws governing fiduciary responsibility, and proper accounting procedures.


The scamployer* now emails a notice to the job seeker victim that funds will be arriving within 3 to 7 days. Included in the email are instructions to deposit the paper instrument and wire funds as soon as the check or money order has cleared** or a soon as the job seeker's bank account is credited with the amount of the check or money order***.


If the scamployer has funds wired directly to the job seeker victim's account, the email instructions will urge the victim to immediately send the funds by Western Union or bank-to-bank transfer upon receipt. Another pressure tactic is to urge the job seeker victim to cash the paper instruments at a check cashing store, grocery store, or to cash money orders at a Post Office. This is sometimes accompanied by a warning that the commission will be less if the wiring of the funds is delayed.


* scamployer: This may be one person pretending to be many (the employer and two or more other company employees such as officers working in fake order centers). It may be three or more people all pretending to be the same one. Many job seeker victims are run by the same ring at the same time using pre-designed scripts. The scripts allow different ring members to pick up the thread with any one of the victims at any given time as necessary.


** cleared: A check is not actually cleared until the account holder says it is. The common usage for the word "cleared" is that the account contains enough money to cover the check when it is presented at the drawee bank.


*** bank account is credited with the amount of the check or money order: In most instances, the money credited into a depositor's account is from his own bank in good faith. It is not money that has arrived from the drawee bank. Therefore, the money in the deposit account is actually a no-interest loan. It's important to keep in mind that by law a depositor is wholly responsible for whatever he deposits into his account, and that includes funds wired into his account and funds deposited into the account by a 3rd, authorized party.


It is the depositor's responsibility to ensure the funds are legal and unencumbered, not the bank's responsibility. A hold on deposited funds is for the purpose of determining whether or not the check will be financially honored upon presentation to the drawee bank, not to determine whether the check is counterfeit, stolen, or forged.

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