UCI undergraduate and graduate students are a frequent target of scammers advertising fake jobs. There are several versions of this scam: impersonating a UCI professor looking for a research assistant/intern, impersonating legitimate companies on job search sites, or impersonating faculty at other universities.
Some examples of the scam emails are:
Fake jobs have several things in common as the scammers want you to send them money.
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- Never send the scammer any money by buying gift cards and sending the redemption codes. Do not send them money through Zelle, PayPal, or Venmo. No legitimate job will ever require you to send money to the company or employer.
- The scammer will send you a check that is over the amount you were supposed to earn. For example, they say the job will pay $400, but you receive a check for $700. They will request that you reimburse them the extra $300. No legitimate company will overpay you like that.
- The scammer will send you a PDF of a check, tell you to buy check stock at an office supply store, and then deposit the check. No legitimate job will ever make you print your own check.
Here are some tips on spotting fake jobs impersonating UCI professors:
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- The email comes from a non-@uci.edu email address.
- There are instructions to respond not by email, but over text message, Signal, or Microsoft Teams.
- The job is paid weekly somewhere between $400-$600 per week. UCI does not pay weekly.
- The sender’s name is different from the signature at the bottom of the email.
- Your first “task” in the job is to look up the price of random items on the Internet.
- Other universities will not hire students to work remotely from UCI. For example, no UCLA professor will hire a UCI student to work remotely at UCLA.
- Some scammers will forge the @uci.edu address of a professor, but when you reply it goes to the scammer’s gmail.com address. When you reply to the email, if the address changes from a @uci.edu to @gmail.com, then it is a scam.
Scammers are also on job search sites like LinkedIn, CareerBuilder, and Indeed impersonating real companies and posting fake jobs. Here are some tips on spotting these fake jobs:
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- Check the email address that is contacting you. Does it match the real corporate website address? If it does not match, it is likely a scam. Scammers will often use an address with “jobs” or “careers” in the name such as apple-careers.com or apple-jobs.com.
- The scammers will attempt to hire you too quickly. If you apply and they email you on Friday, interview you on Saturday, and offer you the job on Sunday, this is likely a scam. No legitimate company hires employees that quickly.
If you have concerns about a job being a potential scam, please contact the UCI Security Team at security@uci.edu
Additional Resources: