A job scammer interviewed me. Here’s how I know.

There’s nothing more despicable than people who take advantage of the vulnerable — old, young, poor, etc. You hear of scammers bilking the elderly out of their fortunes. Scammers are also targeting job seekers in an attempt to steal identities and banking information. As technology has advanced, so has the tools of scammers.

My encounter with a scammer happened during a busy interviewing week for me, so I initially missed a big red flag in my correspondence with the so-called recruiter. Luckily, during the interview, I wised up quickly and escaped the situation with only a severe case of irritation at the time I wasted in prepping for a fake interview.

Here are some of the red flags that appeared during this weird experience.

Discrepancy in the details

I received an email from an account similar to a publication for a job I applied for. But the email came from a .works account, a suffix that isn’t in common usage. It’s a little detail I didn’t notice at first. If the interview request had been genuine, the email would’ve likely come from the HR platform through which I applied Or at least, it would’ve come from the parent company, instead of a facsimile email account.

In addition, the pay offered during the interview was far and away more generous — $56 per hour!! — than what was posted in the original job description, a carrot to get a desperate potential worker to lower their guard.

The photo shows a poorly formatted job description that was submitted by scammers. — *This is a snippet from the pdf I received in my interview invitation. Ug-ly.*

Lack of professionalism

The content I was sent from the so-called recruiter included a poorly designed pdf that included the publicly accessible job description as well as additional content. The fonts were all over the place. My son could’ve designed a better pdf. (To be fair, he is a font snob.)

After the interview was scheduled, the HR person didn’t create an event in Microsoft Teams. They didn’t apologize for being late, and they opted to conducted the interview by “encrypted” text in Teams, rather than in video, all signs of professionalism far below the standard I expect from HR pros. At this point, I figured I wouldn’t take any job these Keystone Cops would offer me.

At the beginning of the interview, the recruiter said I would be allowed to ask questions, but the interview wrapped up without that opportunity. Big red flag!

A snippet of the interview. It includes the command that I should type DONE at the conclusion to the answer.

Despite most of the interview including seemingly normal questions, the process was very awkward via text, with the “HR person” commanding me to write DONE at the conclusion of every response. Granted, I hate Zoom and Teams interviews, particularly if it’s a large group, where you are trying to look at every participant while looking directly at the camera, (impossible!) but an interview conducted via text felt wrong.

An unwarranted sense of urgency

As the interview concluded, the inquisitor added a level of urgency to the proceedings that was out of character for most HR people, saying I would hear something “tomorrow” and that I had to be reachable. That was also a red flag.

The so-called HR person is again commanding me to download the Microsoft Teams app on my smartphone and was telling me I would be updated on my status tomorrow. "Please ensure you remain available and reachable. Is that clear?"

Shortly after the interview ended, I discovered the email discrepancy and quickly put two and two together with a little more digging. It seems the parent company posted a warning on their website about a hiring scam targeting people applying to their positions. I then went back to Microsoft Teams and asked the “recruiter” about these discrepancies, for instance, why wasn’t the email sent through the platform I used to apply to the job and why was there such a significant discrepancy between the pay cited in the job announcement and the pay now being touted? The recruiter saw my questions but didn’t respond. So I blocked them.

How the scam plays out

Had I not blocked that person that afternoon, they likely would’ve contacted me the next day with the fabulous news that I’d been offered the job. They would’ve then asked me to quickly divulge all sorts of personal information — social security number, bank account information, etc. And then I would’ve never heard from them again while they made off with my money and my identity.

Imagine the level of evil it takes to deceive vulnerable people who are moving heaven and Earth to land a job. What a cold heart it must take, almost as cold as the hearts of Elon Musk and his minions who are illegally firing federal employees without cause as Musk guts the federal government.

Kimberly L. Wright