Remote contract workers share their red flags for sorting through scams
Remote job scams are on the rise as more people seek flexible work options.
Scammers often exploit inexperienced job seekers by masquerading as appealing offers.
Experts told BI that caution, careful research, and networking can help you avoid falling for scams.
Portia Moore had already been working from home for five years before the COVID pandemic made flexible schedules popular. She said sifting through scams has always come with the job.
"I got spoiled, working from home," Moore, who runs a job board that lists remote gig work that she vets, said. "Back in 2015, 2017 — it was before remote jobs were very popular. So, I kind of really learned how to find legit remote jobs that weren't scams because scams were everywhere."
They're even more prevalent now, Moore added, since "everybody's going after remote jobs."
More and more Americans are taking on extra work to cope with the rising cost of living. Communities have emerged on sites like TikTok, dedicated entirely to finding legit, lucrative side hustles. Gig remote work — such as copywriting, data entry, and one-off jobs on sites like Fiverr — often offers attractive rates of pay and flexible hours. It is enjoying a resulting boom in popularity.
Jackie Mitchell, who gained traction on TikTok for documenting her goal of making $100 a day through side hustles, said scams often advertise themselves similarly to legitimate remote jobs, luring in searchers with less experience spotting clear red flags. In particular, those in dire financial straits searching for a temporary stopgap are most vulnerable.
"I feel like the side hustle culture kind of becomes — while I need to have second streams of income at this time in my life — I think the mantra now becomes that everyone should, because why wouldn't you want more money?" Mitchell said. "And I think that becomes dangerous."
For her part, Moore has also seen plenty of scammers try to prey on her audience — and says it fits the typical pattern of bad actors aligning themselves with a legitimate brand in order to build trust.
"I just had a TikTok go viral over the weekend, and there's so many scammers in the comments saying, 'Hey, I hire data entry for $40 an hour,'" Moore said. "And I'm like, 'No, guys. That's not real.' So it's mostly people who'll say a legit, popular job title, like data entry."
Many will pretend to be real, big-name companies, Moore said — and with the advent of AI tools, she's seen the phishing websites people are redirected to become harder to distinguish for the genuine article. She's developed a series of red flags she keeps in mind when searching for listings to add to her site.
"If you're getting asked for money, that's a huge red flag," Moore said."It's a job. You shouldn't be paying. If you go to a website and something looks off, or — and I know this is hard to believe — but if someone uses the word 'kindly,' that's usually a red flag."
Kristi Roe-Owen, a freelance writer who supplements her income with gig work for companies like Data Annotation, said a green flag for her is when the sign-up and interview process is complex.
"They wanted a lot of information about my skills, my contributions, and what I had to offer as a writer," Roe-Owen said. "And then immediately after I finished that initial sign-up process, I was prompted to go through qualifications. That was green flags across the board, for me."
Roe-Owen added that building out a network of other freelancers or gig workers helps her learn about postings by word of mouth, even if it's just via a post in her Discord group.
"A green flag is also that I've actually read an experience from someone else who's doing it successfully," Roe-Owen said. "That gives me an idea of what to expect."
Mitchell agrees — a quick search on social media always helps confirm her hunches.
"I find a classic Reddit search does you wonders," Mitchell said.
Keeping your wits about you is the most important part of the process, Moore said, and added to avoid being guided by desperation. She also believes that age-old advice endures for a reason.
"If it sounds too good to be true, it most likely is too good to be true, and you want to do your due diligence," she said. "When you're looking for remote jobs, you do have to take your time. It's a numbers game. You just can't believe that somebody's selling you gold."
Read the original article on Business Insider

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Bloomberg
an hour ago
- Bloomberg
Why Is Huawei Downplaying Its Chips?
It may seem like odd messaging from a tech chief. But Huawei Technologies Co. founder Ren Zhengfei said that Americans have 'exaggerated' his company's chip achievements, which 'still lag behind the US by a generation.' When it comes to the race for the hardware needed to support artificial intelligence, his company 'isn't that powerful yet,' Ren added in a lengthy front-page interview with the People's Daily this week. Still, there is 'no need to worry' about the US restrictions, he insisted. By bundling Huawei's chips together, or so-called clustering, they can still match rival offerings from top global players.


CNBC
an hour ago
- CNBC
The U.S. dollar hasn't been this weak in 3 years. What that means for stock investors
The U.S. dollar index on Thursday hit its lowest level since late March 2022 — putting renewed spotlight on what has been one of the biggest stories in financial markets this year: the weakening greenback. As the world's reserve currency, the U.S. dollar is held in large quantities by global central banks. Key commodities such as gold and oil are priced in dollars. Many foreign transactions, even when American parties aren't involved, also are conducted in dollars. When something that important reaches multiyear lows, investors and consumers alike are forced to consider the implications of the move for U.S. markets and the economy as a whole. At the heart of it is exchange rates. What is the rate at which a foreign buyer can exchange their local currency for dollars? And what is the rate at which Americans can exchange their dollars for foreign currencies? Those who have traveled internationally are likely quite familiar with this. From the investor perspective, the question is how the strength of the dollar plays into our companies' sales and earnings. The U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of foreign currencies including the euro and Japanese yen, has trended lower since January. However, its losses picked up steam after President Donald Trump announced his "Liberation Day" tariffs on April 2. While many assets sold off then and have since recovered, the dollar hasn't shared the same fate. When the dollar is strong, foreign buyers need to trade in more of their local currency — the currency they save and spend in — for U.S. dollars in order to purchase any dollar-denominated goods. Keep in mind: Even if a European purchases an iPhone in euros, those euros are eventually converted to dollars and that conversion rate is going to factor into the euro-denominated price that European shoppers may see in their local store. On the other hand, a weak dollar means that foreign buyers have relatively more buying power. When their local currency strengthens against the dollar, they can trade in fewer local currency units such as euros for an equal number of dollars. In effect, the price has gone down, a dynamic that usually leads to an increase in demand — all else equal. Sales going up because the foreign buyer feels a relative increase in their buying power is one reason why a weaker dollar is generally positive for U.S. companies' overseas business. To be sure, in this scenario, the U.S. company may see an increase in costs for any supplies that it needs to import from foreign countries because their dollars are worth less. However, because companies sell goods and services for more than it costs to make them, the end result is generally a net positive for earnings — the magnitude of that benefit depends, of course, on the share of sales generated outside the U.S. and the makeup of the supply chain. On Microsoft's most recent earnings call, CFO Amy Hood illustrated this dynamic (FX is shorthand for foreign exchange): "With the weakening of the U.S. dollar in April, we now expect FX to increase total revenue growth by 1 point. Within the segments, we expect FX to increase revenue growth by 1 point in Productivity and Business Processes and less than 1 point in Intelligent Cloud and More Personal Computing. We expect FX to increase [cost of goods sold] operating expense growth by less than 1 point." As we see, Microsoft is expecting cost of goods sold to increase at a lower percentage than the benefit to revenue growth. Indeed, we heard similar commentary Thursday from Wall Street veteran and IBM Vice Chair Gary Cohn. Appearing on CNBC's "Squawk Box" on Thursday morning, Cohn affirmed that the weaker dollar is good for IBM. "Yeah, it is," he said. "IBM is an American-based manufacturing company that sells a lot of overseas and repatriates earnings. Think of U.S. domiciled multinational corporations that sell product overseas and report dollar-based earnings." To recap: For investors, a weaker dollar should generally be viewed as a tailwind for foreign sales of U.S. companies — even though some of the benefit may be offset by inputs sourced from foreign markets that are purchased in dollars. The net effect on the bottom line depends on each individual companies' mix of foreign and domestic sales and inputs. There are additional ripple effects on consumer behavior that investors should monitor, beyond the euro-denominated iPhone example we touched on above. Arguably the most important is travel demand, which obviously impacts all sorts of companies including Club name Disney and Bullpen member Airbnb . A weaker dollar means that U.S. citizens traveling abroad will need to convert more dollars than before into the currency of their destination. Consequently, U.S. consumer appetite for international travel should be expected to take a bit of a hit. Back in 2022, when the euro and dollar hit parity for the first time in two decades , everyone was talking about how good it was to be an American traveler going to Europe that summer. It's a different ballgame now. The beneficiaries this summer are foreign travelers coming to the U.S., who will arrive with relatively more buying power than they otherwise would have in January. The U.S. dollar index ended that month around 108. It's around 98 on Thursday. The implication is that a trip to Disney's theme parks in Florida and California is relatively more affordable for intentional travelers than it was just a few months ago. In this way, U.S. companies also may be able to benefit in the domestic market from an increase in foreign tourism — unless there are other countervailing forces that would make them want to travel elsewhere . How does all of this play into our investment decisions? The answer is that it's one data point that we consider in the much larger universe of data. As fundamental investors, we must be aware of the implications of macroeconomic forces such as currency markets. But they do not, by themselves, drive our moves. Consider the case of Apple , where its growth potential in foreign markets is a major opportunity and reason to be optimistic about its future. In that sense, it's reasonable to assume that a weaker dollar would be a positive for the company – and indeed, it is. However, it is not a large enough positive for us to forget about all the other headwinds for Apple. Sure, the dollar is weaker, but it still must deal with tariffs resulting from where its goods are manufactured. There are court battles threatening its lucrative services business. Of course, there's the seeming lack of progress on Apple Intelligence. History suggests Apple is a strong enough operator to navigate these issues – and we are not counting them out of the AI race just yet, given its record-high installed base is a major advantage. The point is that there are much bigger considerations in our investment decisions than currency fluctuations. Or consider the case of Home Depot , which does 92% of sales in the U.S. but sources many goods internationally. The dollar is headwind – to the tune of $275 million in sales in the first quarter – given that the bulk of demand comes from U.S. consumers and the weak dollar serves to increase the supply costs (not unlike an import tariff). However, that is not in our view enough to sell the stock, not when interest rates are expected to decline and in turn provide a boost to the housing market, whether that's through renovations or new building activity. Finally, while we won't get too political, investors should also keep tabs on what is fueling the move in currency markets. In a lot of cases, the "why" behind the move is likely to be far more useful to investors than the absolute strength or weakness of the greenback. In other words, we must ask ourselves what is causing the move, and then ask ourselves what that cause means for our investments. For example, consider a situation where the dollar is weakening simply because interest rates are expected to move lower as the rate of inflation declines – and so there's less demand for U.S. government bonds and the dollars needed to purchase those bonds. That's a pretty solid reason for a weakening dollar and there wouldn't be a cause for concern among investors. On the other hand, if the dollar – or any other currency for that matter – is weakening because investors are growing concerned about the stability in that country, that would likely be cause for concern because it may portend a fundamental shift in capital flow dynamics. In the end though, these are more so concerns for macro-oriented investors. As primarily bottoms-up fundamental investors with a long-term time horizon, we are much more focused on happening with companies themselves — and the industries they're operating in — than we are with the strength of the U.S. dollar in any given stretch of time. (Jim Cramer's Charitable Trust is long HD, DIS and AAPL. See here for a full list of the stocks.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust's portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.


Entrepreneur
an hour ago
- Entrepreneur
How a 12-Year-Old's Side Hustle Makes Nearly $50,000 a Month
When Madden Forrest, 12, and his dad, Steven Forrest, 35, started breaking cards — purchasing and opening the sealed products to reveal their contents — it was just for fun. Pokémon cards were first, followed by football. Then Madden watched TikTok creators who livestreamed the process and sold cards to interested buyers. Image Credit: Courtesy of Bull Island Breaks. Madden and Steven Forrest. Madden asked his dad if they could try it themselves, and in October of 2024, the side hustle was born. "We didn't know what we were doing," Steven tells Entrepreneur. "We saw other people doing it. Everyone was ripping this one particular box — it was a Costco [football card] box exclusive. You could only get them from Costco; we didn't even have a Costco membership. We just posted on Facebook, and a buddy of mine hit me up and said, 'Hey, I can get 10 of them at Costco right now.'" Those 10 boxes cost about $1,000, and the investment paid off: The father-son side hustlers sold them in one afternoon. Soon after, Madden and Steven replicated the success with a $500 card set purchase from Sam's Club. Because TikTok prohibits minors from hosting livestreams, Steven took the lead in front of the camera on the Bull Island Breaks account (named for their city in Virginia), and he continues to do so. Related: This 17-Year-Old High School Student Has a $20,000-a-Month Side Hustle — and It All Started With a Skill He Learned in Class Fueled by the early success, Madden and Steven kept at the hustle, breaking both single packs and hobby boxes, which can retail for thousands of dollars. " Most average people can't afford to buy a whole box and risk it," Steven explains, "so we do breaks. Everyone buys a team from the NFL, and then if their card hits, they get that card. If it doesn't hit, we give them free cards. I've got over 50,000 from my collection from when I was a kid. So we just give them to people for free." Image Credit: Courtesy of Bull Island Breaks. Madden Forrest. The father-son entrepreneurs dabbled in selling baseball and basketball cards but continued to see the most success with football, which they attribute to the fact that they "live and breathe" the sport. On a typical Sunday, the Forrests tune into football from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m., sometimes even earlier if there's an international game in the morning. Related: A Teen With Cerebral Palsy Pitched a Creative Product in School. He Got a B- — Then Grew the Business to $5 Million a Year Anyway. From October to December, Steven says they were "half-in" on the side hustle, riding a lot of demand that came with the holiday season and wondering if it was just a lucky streak. However, any questions about Bull Island Breaks' potential were cleared up on New Year's Eve — thanks in part to fewer sellers online, the account cornered the market and did more than $4,000 in sales. "We've been doing roughly $2,000 every day of June so far." Madden and Steven resolved to double down on the business in 2025. Bull Island Breaks launches its livestream every night at 7 p.m. The Forrests prioritize value breaks for the business. For example, they might invest about $120 for a single pack, then charge about double, between $400 and $450, or source a $1.25 pack from Dollar Tree and turn it around for $6.99. Bull Island Breaks has seen more than 7,000 orders and $180,000 in gross sales between January and June. The business pulled in about $28,000 in January, $34,000 in February, $36,000 in March, $34,000 in April and $49,000 in May, bringing the year-to-date profit to around $70,000, Steven says. In June, the ambitious goal is to hit $65,000 in monthly revenue. Related: This Nashville Mom Started a Flexible Side Hustle on Facebook — Then Grew It From $1,000 to $275,000 a Month: 'Like a Scavenger Hunt' " August is when training camp starts, so we project things to go way up [then]," Steven says, "because now we have a little bit of a following. We've been doing it every night consistently. So I think $65,000 is probably more attainable come August, but I think we'll do every bit of $30,000 this month. We've been doing roughly $2,000 every day of June so far." All of the money is for Madden, whose behind-the-scenes dedication makes Bull Island Breaks possible, Steven notes. At first, it seemed like the business would earn enough income to fund a future car, but if the current trajectory continues, it may even cover college and a house. Madden, who turns 13 next month, also dreams of opening his own card shop one day. Image Credit: Courtesy of Bull Island Breaks. Madden Forrest. Despite the business's consistent success, there have been some challenges. Madden recalls a time when TikTok banned the Bull Island Breaks account after a simple misunderstanding. "We're big Commanders fans, so our first mess-up was buying the Commanders [cards] in our shop and refunding ourselves," Madden says. "TikTok doesn't really like when you refund people, so it's better to just take [the product] out of stock. When we did that a couple of times, they held our money for 60 days." " They thought we were buying them to artificially look good and leave ourselves good reviews," Steven adds. "The Commanders are the most expensive team because they have Jayden Daniels, the rookie, [and] essentially, no one wants to buy the Commanders because it's a lot of money — you're talking a $100 every single time. So we would just buy them ourselves and reimburse [because] we basically get them for free by doing the break." Now, the father-son team just removes the cards they take from the stock to avoid the issue. "You have to keep going [with] consistency." Madden and Steven's expanding network helps them sustain their stock and grow the passion project. "I love meeting some great people that buy from us, ripping the cards and spending time with [my dad]," Madden says. "A couple years ago [meeting friends online] sounded weird, but now that we've immersed ourselves in this, we'll be at the card shop looking for stuff for ourselves, and we'll be like, 'Oh, Mary would like that card, or John would love that card," Steven adds. "And we get it for them. We show it to them on the live, and they're excited, like, 'Oh, how much do you want for it?' We're like, 'Dude, we're going to send this to you. You guys have supported us so much.'" Related: Teen Brothers Started a Side Hustle on Facebook Marketplace That's on Track for $1.2 Million This Year: 'Quit My Job and Went All In' As they look to the future of Bull Island Breaks, Madden and Steven are excited to keep growing their audience, and they know that staying consistent will remain the secret to success. "The first time everyone sees [this business], they think it's really easy, but it takes commitment and hard work," Madden says. "You have to keep going [with] consistency: posting every day, going live every day." This article is part of our ongoing Young Entrepreneur® series highlighting the stories, challenges and triumphs of being a young business owner. Want to read more stories like this? Subscribe to Money Makers, our free newsletter packed with creative side hustle ideas and successful strategies. Sign up here.