technology
Employment Scam Reports to BBB Doubled, Losses Rose to $501 Million
Reports of employment scams to the Better Business Bureau doubled last year, with losses rising from $90 million in 2020 to $501 million in 2024. Two victims described receiving polished messages from fake recruiters after posting job interest online or applying directly. Experts recommend verifying contacts through official company channels.
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Employment scam reports to the Better Business Bureau doubled last year compared with the year before, Fortune reported. Losses grew from $90 million in 2020 to $501 million in 2024. Nearly 50,000 people reported falling victim to such scams in the past three years.
Mary Ann Morrison, an instructional design manager in Fayetteville, Arkansas, applied for a position at the University of Arkansas in Little Rock and received an email requesting an interview. The message included a Microsoft Teams link that asked her to update the app, though she saw no such notification in her own software.
She checked the university directory and found no record of the recruiter, then noted that the email domain did not match the institution’s human resources address.
She reported the contact to the university, which said it would warn others. Vanessa Goodman, who works in technology sales and marketing near Houston, added the hashtag “open to work” to a LinkedIn post. She soon received messages from accounts claiming to represent Microsoft and Palo Alto Networks.
After she sent her resume, the accounts forwarded an offer letter and asked her to pay $800 to a third party for supporting documents, promising reimbursement. The callers reached her three times late at night at the number listed on her resume, prompting her to uninstall WhatsApp.
Roger Grimes, a chief information security officer advisor at KnowBe4, said scammers typically seek several hundred to several thousand dollars or access to an employer.
