Work From Home Scams
Let’s be honest here: at least once in your life you have clicked on that “work from home” opportunity just out of curiosity. Everyone has. Who wouldn’t want to make a full-time income (or more) while sitting in their pajamas eating frosted flakes? It appeals to the child in us.
Work from home scams are effective because they play to our deepest desires. They take advantage of our curiosity and make us feel that a real opportunity lies just a click away.
The Slug Example
Check out the picture below.
(Warning: it’s a little bit graphic. If you don’t like creepy-crawlies, you may want to skip it.)
I snapped this photograph of hundreds of slugs a few days ago while walking home on a rainy Wednesday afternoon here in the city of roses. Yes, there are disadvantages to living in such a rainy climate! I’ve never seen so many slugs in my life. It was disgusting!
But what does this have to do with work at home careers?
Why, it goes to illustrate my point that not everything is as it seems of course!
Those pine cones (yes, they are nothing but unusual northern pine cones) LOOK like slugs, and admit it; you were convinced that they were slugs because I told you they were, but you were wrong! If you had just seen that image randomly on the internet, you probably wouldn’t have even thought they were slugs. At first glance, it isn’t really clear what they are, but slugs? Probably not the first thing you would guess.
Scammers use a similar tactic to cover up their pyramid schemes and work from home “opportunities.” They call their business something that it is not lie to you about the earnings, and play to your desires.
How to Spot a Work At Home Scam
Easy. Don’t sign up for anything that advertises “working from home.” It’s a scam. It doesn’t matter that 1% of these ads are not scams. That’s too low a percentage to actually risk giving any information over to these people. Just assume they are all scams. 100%. A real company will never post a job ad with the title “work from home.”
If you really want to work from home (it’s called telecommuting, or having a mobile office) then try to create this type arrangement with your day job, start your own business, or work in a field where you can actually do the work at home. (Like web design or freelance editing) No company is going to pay some stranger they have never met hordes of cash over the internet to forward e-mails or lick envelopes or assemble toys. It doesn’t happen.
In the end, these “jobs” are worth their weight in slugs.
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Ross November 17, 2007 at 10:52 pm
haha, awesome…you could take some hilarious pictures with those slug-like pine cones (i.e. coming out of your nose, etc.). and yeah, i’ve always wondered about those work from home e-mails.