Hello everyone,
I've been invited to a few jobs and have seen more the past few days that are a bit like this (changed the text so it is not exactly what the job description says!)
"*** Edited for Community Guidelines ***"
Any message, whatever the wording (even "This is not my are of expertise, but hey - I could try!") is answered with something like
"Great! Could you start right now? Here is a dropbox link"
The pdf then contains the instructions - writing scam articles about this not-yet-existing ("it's all still a secret! 😉") company, their "method" (there was an episode of "Hustle" showing something like what they describe) and especially their successful and happy past clients ("You can make something up here!").
The "client" is usually a picture of some middle-aged white man with a funny made up name that sounds a bit English with one letter changed - like *** Edited for Community Guidelines *** etc.
So I now "know" that this is spam for me and the job is scammers looking to jump onto the current wave of similar pages popping up in Germany and other German-speaking countries trying to get money out of people.
The thing is: I know that from the conversation, a bit of research, the privatly sent pdf and experience/intuition with this specific brand of scamming. They do not have "We'd like to steal people's money" in the job description.
How do I report these jobs?
As with many other cases: The work they are asking me to do is not illegal (I can write as much fiction about non-existing companies as they want me to), but the moment they publish the fiction in a certain way it turns into a scam.
Is this "Every freelancer has to find out themselves" or is it something were we can do more so others don't waste their time or even become part of these crimes?
Thank you for reading!
