Lurking on sites like LinkedIn and Indeed, or among incoming text messages and emails, is another deception to avoid in the already poor job market: fake recruiters.
Posing as representatives of major companies, they will contact you out of the blue and offer you a job so tempting that 40% of targets ignore the warning signs and move forward with the “interview.”
More than half of them, 51%, end up being scammed into giving up personal data or money.
Those findings come from a survey of more than 1,200 U.S. job seekers published in October by Password Manager. “The prevalence of fake recruiters caught my attention several years ago,” says Gunnar Kallstrom, the cybersecurity expert who conducted a survey for the company, which reviews password management apps. “Since then, the number of fake recruiters has been increasing… posing as recruiters from well-known companies.”
According to the survey, those companies include Amazon, Google, FedEx, UPS, Walmart, Apple and “Facebook” (identified that way instead of Meta in the survey), in that order of frequency.
These scams pose real risks to job seekers who fall for them. Fake recruiters steal Social Security numbers, banking information, and passwords in a variety of ways, some sneakier or more sophisticated than others. The Better Business Bureau’s 2024 Scam Risk Tracking Report puts the average dollar loss for victims at $1,500, no small sum, especially considering these people are likely out of work.
They not only result in material losses; They also take a serious toll on the morale of job seekers. More than half of Password Manager respondents said they now “trust job opportunities less” and “find the process more stressful”; 40% say they’ve even passed up legitimate posts, too worried they’ll be scammed again. The trend is, at best, a nuisance; an active threat at worst.
Still, fake job recruiters have plenty of clues that job seekers can use to spot them. Companies are also increasingly aware of the tactics of these scammers.
Representatives of some of the companies most frequently impersonated by fake recruiters saidfast companyExactly what job seekers should pay attention to to avoid falling victim to these insidious recruitment scams.
What is the modus operandi of false recruiters?
Overall, fake recruiters “operate exactly like a social engineering campaign,” Kallstrom says, “where their modus operandi is to create a sense of urgency, legitimacy, and promise of reward for their victims.”
Those surprise text messages you get saying your resume caught a recruiter’s attention, but the position they’re hiring for needs to be filled ASAP? Don’t give it a second look.
“We just don’t do anything to create an undue sense of urgency,” says Brian Ong, Google’s vice president of recruiting. You’ve heard from Google candidates and employees about people falsely posing as members of the company’s recruiting team, sending direct messages and emails even to those who haven’t previously applied for jobs at Google. They will use emails or websites, Ong adds, which appear to belong to Google, and often use the company logo.
“We have also seen situations where these scams use our name and brand to request money or an immediate in-person interview,” says Ong, “both of which misrepresent our hiring process.”
Meanwhile, Amazon has noted that customers are reporting an “increase in scammers posing as Amazon recruiters in September and October 2025,” says Scott Knapp, the company’s global vice president of shopper risk prevention. These “recruiters” will ask for information like social security numbers, banking information, or Amazon account details—information that the company’s actual recruiters wouldn’t ask for.
At Target, No. 9 on Password Manager’s list of most spoofed companies, scams tend to focus on “secret shopper” opportunities, according to the company’s website. Through emails with subject lines such as “job opening” or “influence opportunities,” scammers will offer free products or cash in exchange for recipients to purchase items to review online, or to purchase gift cards and share card information with fake Target representatives.
Tactics vary depending on the type of company the scammers are impersonating, adapting to “whatever seems ‘normal’ for that brand,” Kallstrom says.
Fake FedEx delivery job offers will arrive via text messages: “Urgent hiring need, no interview required,” Kallstrom says, a fairly likely claim since delivery companies tend to hire seasonal employees for busy times, like holidays, without asking for extensive interviews or experience.
For Meta, on the other hand, “because it’s a tech company, there can be a fake HR portal, software skills assessments, and fake interviews,” adds Kallstrom, who describes hiring scams at tech companies as more sophisticated. They may involve comprehensive skills tests for software engineers that include coding challenges, through which scammers end up downloading malware onto the coder’s computer. The high salaries offered by these fake recruiters can also cause applicants to “let their guard down,” Kallstrom says, “because they are attracted to money.”
Generally, scammers choose these companies because of their name recognition, Kallstrom says: “They are great bait for an unsuspecting potential victim.”
How do you identify a recruiter impersonator?
“Any request for personal information is probably a sign of a scam,” says Google’s Ong, adding that candidates who have applied for jobs at Google have already shared information such as email addresses and phone numbers. Real recruiters shouldn’t ask for these, especially not alongside a Google Meet invite or a link to a login page where users must enter that information to log in.
Notices from the scammer will also appear on your own email addresses. Ong says he and his colleagues have seen fake recruiters with “incomplete websites or misspelled emails” along with contacts “from people who don’t have Google in their title or email.” Spelling errors, poor grammar, and general inconsistencies could indicate a copycat. Emails or websites filled with stock photos should also merit a sidelong glance.
As obvious as it may seem, you should avoid any job opportunity that comes with a request for payment, even if it is an indirect payment, such as requesting the purchase of a gift card. “Amazon will never ask you to provide payment information, including gift cards (or ‘verification cards,’ as some scammers call them) for products or services,” Knapp says.
Ultimately, if you’re not sure if a job opportunity is a scam, check the company’s website. Companies tend to post their job openings online. Both Google and Amazon representatives point to their companies’ online job boards, where those who have received offers to apply for jobs can verify that those postings actually appear on their websites.
Job seekers can also perform due diligence on suspected recruiters conducting outreach activities. “Verify the contact by checking email addresses,” says Ong, “by searching for the person online, such as on LinkedIn. And if something seems suspicious, flag it where you received it.”
What to do if you have been attacked?
The first step is to report it. “The more consumers report scams to us, the better our tools will be at identifying bad actors so we can take action against them and protect consumers,” Knapp says, pointing to Amazon’s scam help page where recipients can report scams. The company works with consumer groups like the National Cybersecurity Alliance and the Better Business Bureau to create “awareness campaigns” about the latest and most common scams.
Amazon is also partnering with law enforcement “around the world,” Knapp adds, to hold scammers accountable, having “initiated the removal of more than 55,000 phishing websites and 12,000 phone numbers used as part of spoofing schemes” in 2024.
A Target representative says cybersecurity experts at the company’s Cyber Fusion Center “use advanced tools and training to prevent and address potential threats.” This includes tools developed by the company as part of an open source initiative on GitHub, such as one that scans files, such as emails, for potential malicious activity.
“Anyone can be scammed on social media” or “receive a text message about a job opportunity that’s too good to be true,” Knapp says.
“If something seems too good to be true, it’s probably a phishing scam.”