Job listing scams are rising fast

Losses from fake work-from-home job advertisements hit nearly $80,000 in June alone, according to online safety organisation Netsafe, capping what it describes as a steady upward trend over recent months.

Reports climbed from just two in April to three in May and six in June. These are small numbers in isolation but the average loss per report now exceeds $13,000. Actual total losses in June were $78,500. Netsafe’s Digital Harm Services Manager, Alex Yi, says it’s the trajectory rather than the raw count that’s concerning.

The scam typically starts with a fake job ad, often for flexible work-from-home roles, posted on social media. Applicants are accepted quickly and taken through what looks like genuine induction and training, including instructions to post online reviews of products and services that turn out to be entirely fake.

The catch comes when new “employees” are told to pay for these products themselves first, with the promise of reimbursement and extra pay once the review goes live. That reimbursement never arrives; the money simply goes to the scammer.

“Vulnerable people, such as those looking for work during a time of high unemployment, and people who have recently immigrated to New Zealand, are especially at risk of being scammed in this way. The harm suffered is both financial and emotional, with significant amounts of money involved plus the sense of betrayal and shame people may feel in these situations.”

New Zealand Police and personal finance site Sorted have also flagged another version of this scam that moves the conversation off social media entirely. After an initial reply to a job post, victims are steered toward WhatsApp, Telegram or Discord and sent a link to download an app to complete their “application.”

Installing it is where things go wrong: phones begin freezing, often displaying what looks like a system update, while scammers quietly extract banking logins and personal details in the background.

Some victims have needed to factory-reset their phones or replace them entirely. Sorted also warns that messages often arrive from what looks like a New Zealand phone number, deliberately spoofed to feel local and trustworthy, when the sender could be anywhere in the world.

Spotting either version comes down to a handful of consistent checks. Genuine recruiters don’t rush candidates off official platforms and onto messaging apps, and they never ask new hires to pay for equipment, training materials or “products” before any income has been earned.

Verifying a company independently by finding a real website, contactable details and conducting a search for existing reviews before responding to any offer remains the single most effective filter. Any request to download an app from outside the Google Play or Apple App Store, or to hand over banking details ahead of a signed contract, should be treated as an immediate stop sign regardless of how professional the exchange has seemed.

Anyone who suspects they’ve been caught up in either scam should contact their bank immediately, report it to police on 105, and file a report with Netsafe. From this month, Netsafe’s scam support has moved to an AI-assisted platform, ReScam.org, which can also be used to forward suspicious emails for analysis. The advice from all three organisations is the same: pause before paying, downloading or handing over any personal information, no matter how convincing the opportunity looks.

The bigger picture to job hunt scams

New Zealanders lost $2.3 billion to scams of all kinds in 2025, an increase of $200 million on the year before, with employment-related scams estimated to account for roughly 28% of that total — around $644 million.

Netsafe’s chief online safety officer Sean Lyons has described employment scams as a significant and rising share of the country’s overall scam losses, a pattern echoed internationally as fraudsters increasingly target job seekers through channels like WhatsApp and other messaging apps.

The tension for job seekers is that these scams are specifically engineered to exploit the vulnerability of searching for work. Netsafe has flagged that people looking for jobs during periods of high unemployment, along with recent immigrants navigating an unfamiliar job market, face particular risk, precisely the groups least able to absorb a financial loss and most likely to feel pressure to act quickly on what looks like a promising opportunity.

New research from Trend Micro’s TrendLife division backs this up, finding that nearly one in five New Zealanders surveyed had personally been scammed, or knew someone close to them who had, specifically during a job interview process.

The mechanics of the most common current scam follow a recognisable pattern. A “work from home” advertisement promises flexible hours and easy pay, often requiring nothing more than a phone or computer to get started.

Once engaged, victims are asked to spend their own money on supposed business expenses or equipment, with the promise of reimbursement that never arrives, a structure designed to feel like a normal onboarding cost rather than an obvious red flag. Genuine employers do not ask new hires to pay money upfront for equipment, training materials or account setup before any income has been earned.

Legitimate recruiters and employers use verifiable company email domains rather than generic webmail addresses, and are willing to have a phone or video conversation rather than conducting an entire hiring process over text or messaging apps.

Any request for banking details, a copy of an ID document, or upfront payment before a formal contract is signed should be treated as an immediate stop signal, regardless of how professional the rest of the exchange has seemed.

The MBIE’s New Zealand Anti-Scam Alliance is working on broader protections, including expanded bank verification systems and updated telecommunications sector codes, but those measures take time to roll out. In the meantime, the most reliable protection is that a job will see you make money, not lose it.