| Pages in topic: < [1 2] | A job advertized on Proz turns out to be a scam Thread poster: #JuliaC#
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| Post removed: This post was hidden by a moderator or staff member for the following reason: Requested edition not made. | IvanKo 
Russian Federation
Local time: 09:51
English to Russian
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| what's the benefit | Oct 6, 2011 |
Yes, this is really bad. The only thing I do not understand what was the use in demanding the translator's contact address and name/phone number without any private financial info. What was the real purpose of the scammer?
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Ivan Korotkiy wrote:
Yes, this is really bad. The only thing I do not understand what was the use in demanding the translator's contact address and name/phone number without any private financial info. What was the real purpose of the scammer?
with these kind of scams, they send you a cheque for a value well over the one you quoted and then they ask you to send them the difference.
| | | | #JuliaC#
Local time: 08:51
German to Italian
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TOPIC STARTER | As Alejandro suggested me | Oct 7, 2011 |
I've submitted a support request with the link to the job in question.
I thank you all for expressing your opinions.
I know this kind of scam is very well wide spread, and I've received offers like it many times. Never fell into this trap. However I think this particular case deserved more attention since it came from a job published on Proz.
Like many others however, I think that people who desperately need to work are not stupid, neither those to whom it ... See more I've submitted a support request with the link to the job in question.
I thank you all for expressing your opinions.
I know this kind of scam is very well wide spread, and I've received offers like it many times. Never fell into this trap. However I think this particular case deserved more attention since it came from a job published on Proz.
Like many others however, I think that people who desperately need to work are not stupid, neither those to whom it can happen to become victim of this kind of scam.
Thank you all again and have a good day! ▲ Collapse
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David Güdel
Italy
Local time: 08:51
German to Italian
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| I was actually stupid enough to... | Oct 7, 2011 |
...give him an answer!
Here's what I got back:
"Hello David,
Thanks for your quick response,I am glad to have you as my freelancer translator.I confirm that it is English > German.Your total is euro 715 is acceptable,I will offer 30 percent down-payment will be issued out before commencement of work for i do understand it is necessary since we working online and balance after completion of project.Deadline is 3weeks.Please note that i will be paying with Euro Travelers C... See more ...give him an answer!
Here's what I got back:
"Hello David,
Thanks for your quick response,I am glad to have you as my freelancer translator.I confirm that it is English > German.Your total is euro 715 is acceptable,I will offer 30 percent down-payment will be issued out before commencement of work for i do understand it is necessary since we working online and balance after completion of project.Deadline is 3weeks.Please note that i will be paying with Euro Travelers Check and i am expecting the best from you."
I got suspiciuous from the first mail i got from him (German name, writing in broken English when I answered his job posting in German), but answered nevertheless.
Can he do anything with my personal data? I didn't give him any bank or financial details. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Zea_Mays
Italy
Local time: 08:51
Member (2009)
English to German
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| not the first time | Oct 7, 2011 |
Other similar scams through job postings are discussed here:
... See more
| | | | Laurent KRAULAND (X)
France
Local time: 08:51
French to German
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| Blocking IP addresses? | Oct 7, 2011 |
Zea_Mays wrote:
(.../...)
Perhaps Proz could try to block their IP address if it's always the same or a similar one.
I do not know how well this works, but it is certainly not the most effective solution (albeit one of the fastest).
Nothing will replace double- and triple-checking all of the job postings with more in-depth checks.
Sorry if I am stating something obvious, but the easiness with which people can create a throw-away e-mail address should be taken into account (and job posters should not be allowed to use such addresses).
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@ Tony: I understand how you came to the conclusion you wrote down in your post. But the sad truth is that, despite of all the current check procedures, jobs posted on ProZ.com are not always 100% genuine.
Furthermore and when this option is available, I encourage colleagues to opt in for having their incoming messages on ProZ.com vetted by staff as mentioned in your post. I have found this to be a great help.
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@ Guilia: Tony's reply to your post would have been much different if you had clearly written in your OP that you received this scam job offer through the ProZ.com jobs system.
[Edited at 2011-10-07 09:08 GMT]
| | | | #JuliaC#
Local time: 08:51
German to Italian
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TOPIC STARTER
Just to be clear: I was not offended at all by Tony's reply and I do appreciate each of your comments, which I find useful and stimulating, as your thought upon the easiness with which one can create an e-mail account.
But I do feel that, apart from the topic of this particular post on this forum, the adjective "stupid" should not be used so easily, that's all.
P.s: I thought "A job advertised on Proz" was clear enough.
[Edited at 2011-10-07 09:29 GMT]
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| I felt into the trap!!! and now? :-( | Oct 7, 2011 |
Hi everyone,
call me stupid! I'm a stupid person...:-( I felt into the trap, I gave him all the information (my personal data, not the banking account) and my rate per page and now he asked me the rate per word...after reading this forum (and after darning myself) I answered him that I cannot collaborate with him and I don't want to be paied in advance because it is not my way of work. I specify that I don't accept any kind of payment due in my favour.
According to you, it is... See more Hi everyone,
call me stupid! I'm a stupid person...:-( I felt into the trap, I gave him all the information (my personal data, not the banking account) and my rate per page and now he asked me the rate per word...after reading this forum (and after darning myself) I answered him that I cannot collaborate with him and I don't want to be paied in advance because it is not my way of work. I specify that I don't accept any kind of payment due in my favour.
According to you, it is enough? I have to do any operation other I have to contact anyone?
Thank you so much for your answer,
Margherita ▲ Collapse
| | | | Tony M
France
Local time: 08:51
French to English
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SITE LOCALIZER | Inform site staff | Oct 7, 2011 |
Margherita Zappatore wrote:
I felt into the trap...
I have to do any operation other I have to contact anyone?
Commiserations! As you have cut off dialogue with the person, I very much doubt they will bother to follow it up any further.
However, if this was a job advertised through the ProZ.com job system, you should certainly alert staff by submitting a support request, in case the accumulated information helps them to pinpoint the offender better.
| | | | Zea_Mays
Italy
Local time: 08:51
Member (2009)
English to German
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| A free email address is not always bad | Oct 7, 2011 |
Laurent KRAULAND wrote:
Sorry if I am stating something obvious, but the easiness with which people can create a throw-away e-mail address should be taken into account (and job posters should not be allowed to use such addresses).
-------------------------------------------] I understand your point but private persons often do not register their own domain name, which you need if you want to avoid free provider.
Some time ago I got well paid job through a job posting where a free email address was used.
It was a similar posting to the one we are discussing here: private person, address etc. which resulted to be correct. Initially that time I thought it's a scam because of the strange address and the strange name of the poster, but then I found out he exists and is a really nice person. Later I got another assignment by this customer.
This positive experience is also the reason why after checking the given information I answered to this posting, where the poster used the name and the address - plus the profession in the email address - of a really existing person.
| | | | Tony M
France
Local time: 08:51
French to English
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SITE LOCALIZER | Blocking IP addresses | Oct 7, 2011 |
The trouble is, this cannot be used in all situations; very often, an IP address turns out to be that of an ISP, and as far as I understand it, blocking that IP address would block ALL communications for anyone who happened to use that ISP, with potentially disastrous consequences for us all!
This happens to me quite a lot; sadly, for some reason my ISP (Wanadoo) has got a bad reputation for itself as a source of spam, as a result of which many hosts block all my messages — this i... See more The trouble is, this cannot be used in all situations; very often, an IP address turns out to be that of an ISP, and as far as I understand it, blocking that IP address would block ALL communications for anyone who happened to use that ISP, with potentially disastrous consequences for us all!
This happens to me quite a lot; sadly, for some reason my ISP (Wanadoo) has got a bad reputation for itself as a source of spam, as a result of which many hosts block all my messages — this is particularly true (and irksome!) for hosts in the US and Canada — there are many of my transatlantic colleagues whom I simply cannot contact via e-mail at all!
This seemed to be slightly better during the period when I had a fixed IP address, which is sadly no longer the case.
I'm quite certain that ProZ does do everything possible to protect us all, but ultimately, it is our own responsibility to take whatever precautions we deem appropriate; "don't shoot the messenger", as they say!
Let's face it, any automated system is bound to be imperfect, and manually vetting every single job advert would be incredibly labour-intensive, increase lead times for possibly urgent jobs — and be potentially impractical for jobs posted in languages not covered by ProZ site staff.
Take a broader view: a small number of ProZ staff would have to vet a huge number of jobs; whereas we, a huge number of ProZ members, each only have to vet a relatively small number of job offers.
Surely the most useful thing we can do is to systematically alert site staff to any suspicious job offers via a support ticket; although they might get inundated, I feel sure this is preferable — at least it would ensure that other users are alerted as rapidly as possible. ▲ Collapse
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Tony M
France
Local time: 08:51
French to English
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SITE LOCALIZER | Commenting on Laurent's post | Oct 7, 2011 |
Laurent KRAULAND wrote:
@ Tony: I understand how you came to the conclusion you wrote down in your post. But the sad truth is that, despite of all the current check procedures, jobs posted on ProZ.com are not always 100% genuine.
Yes, I do of course realize that, but I feel sure ProZ.com is as keen as we are to deal with this problem; clearly vetting job offers must be very difficult, and I'm sure already there are many checks in place. But ultimately, ProZ cannot 'censor' things that MIGHT be a genuine job — this was the response I recived when I recently reported 2 likely scams. the problem is possibly that no one person sees all the job adverts, and so any pattern might not be noticed (in a way that each of us can quite easily see when the same or similar advert or e-mail apears over and over again); and in some cases, the scam only becomes apparent once one has replied to the original advert, which seems to be the case here as cited by Giulia. So how could staff have possibly known in advance, unless they had actually answered the advert themselves?
The use of poor English is often a giveaway sign, certainly once one receives the longer reply messages; however, we have to bear in mind that lots of jobs are posted in EN by PMs etc. who may not necessarily have native proficiency in EN. So once again, that criterion is difficult to apply 'up front'.
| | | | Tony M
France
Local time: 08:51
French to English
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SITE LOCALIZER | Commenting on Zea's post | Oct 7, 2011 |
Zea_Mays wrote:
A free email address is not always bad.
Indeed, this is true, and has been debated in the forums before, at some length.
All this just goes to show that no single set of simple criteria is enough to reliably weed out this sort of scam — just as we know from general experience with spam in our e-mail boxes.
I just think we need to focus on what WE as the recipients can do to avoid this sort of problem in the future.
1) Spread the word — this sort of forum thread, and the Wiki that has been started on it, is a jolly goos start; and it behoves each of us to make sure we are as informed as possible and keep abreast of developments in this field
2) Whilst maintaining a spirit of 'good faith', it is also a good idea to be on our guard.
3) There are several checks one can readily perform to verify (or not) the legitimacy of people who contact us — and the less information they voluntarily provide, the more circumspect one should perhaps be.
And as has been said before, if in doubt, "delete and forget" — I don't waste any time on such requests if I have work on the go, but if I'm a bit slack, then I usually follow them up, not to get the work, but simply to investigate a potential scam so that I can find out as much information as possible and perhaps alert others.
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