I received the following email stating I'd inquired about a job with this company. I've never heard of them or applied with them, which let me know it's probably a scam 🚩, so I put on my sleuth hat and started digging for dirt! 🕵 I'll take you through the steps I took to investigate this company.
The Email Approach
Text version:
Quality Control position
Amber Smith <amber.s51@aol.com>
May 7, 2019, 10:51 AM (11 days ago)
to amber.s51
Good day!
We have received your inquiry regarding the job of a Quality Quality Specialist and we are glad to offer you this job offer.
If you'd like to know more about the position you can fill in your Job Application form.
Our Google Documents will give you the insight regarding this offer :
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ntc6am2Jw-I3ZOX63NrDzslKBVkqSXtkMlREXu92GOo/
Best regards,
Carol Williams
HR Team
Errors
The clumsy and incorrect sentences suggest a possible scam.
Names
The email is from Amber Smith but the signer is Carol Williams - a strong indicator of fraud🚩. However, Amber's account on AOL could've been hacked and maybe the scammers don't know how to spoof email, they don't care, want to get her in trouble, or it could be that Amber is a moron.
Signature
The signature lacks any identifying information that you'd expect to see from a company, such as job title, company name, address, phone and logo. This is not absolute proof of fraud, but it is very suggestive.
Email Address
Most companies use a custom email address unless they're very small. This is from AOL.com, instead, which suggests fraud.🚩
Inconsistent Job Title
Is it Quality Control, Quality (Quality) Specialist or Quality Control Manager (from the PDF and application)? This lack of consistency is unlikely to ever be seen for a legitimate job.
Lack of Response
I sent two emails to them asking for more information, but got no response.
The PDF with the Job Description
DOT Code
I tried searching for this but was unable to locate DOT Code: 211.312-3480 on https://occupationalinfo.org/.🚩
Work Hours
The last time I checked, 40 hours a week is full-time, yet it says "Hours: Monday-Friday, 10am – 6pm local time [part time]".
The Job
This doesn't look like a remote job, with phrases like: "the facility," "warehouse traffic," and "warehouse capacity."
Source
The most interesting tidbit I found was when I clicked on "report" on Google docs. It turns out that those behind this are probably Russian.🚩
Their Website
I visited their website, provided in the Google document the email linked to. There were so many things wrong with it that it fairly screamed "scam!"
I've tried to reproduce the website below.
Internet Search
This website is NOT searchable from a search engine like Google, which is a strong indicator of fraud because a legitimate company will not hide its website from search engines if it wants to get clients.🚩
No job postings can be found by searching the web. How can a company find employees without having a web presence and job posting(s) that can be searched for? Sure, you could use networking, recruiters, etc., but this is highly suspicious.🚩
Surprisingly, when I searched for the address, I found the website!
In addition, there is no record of them on ICANN.org. Any legitimate organization's website will be listed on ICANN.🚩
Simple Website
Legitimate companies generally have multiple pages to share information about them. The only other page is the application page, which I show below, and is the only fully-functional part of the site.🚩
Completely by accident, I found the Tapwater.in website, which uses an almost identical setup from Colorlib.
Where are the links to their products/services page? Where is the about page? 🚩
Menu
The menu you see at the top only links to the other parts of the same page. The obscured "Sign in" link at the top takes you to the webform at the bottom of the page.🚩
Contact
If you enter your email address and press 
If you use the webform at the bottom, after entering your name, email address and message, it doesn't send the data to a server - it opens up your webmail service and does not put the subject in the subject line or make any effort to format the information so that it looks correct in the email. This is atypical of a webform that opens your webmail and, along with other things, suggests a quickly put together site to fool people.
Interestingly, they have an email address listed that is official, so why didn't they contact me from there instead of AOL?
Apply
Why is the "Join our team" section on the home page? This is generally not put on a company's homepage but is usually linked to via a "careers" or "jobs" link in the header or footer.
Note that there are only 3 positions that can be applied for.
Services and Features
None of the listed delivery solutions and features can be clicked on.🚩
What's even more telling, however, is that bottom line of features that has, seemingly, been hidden by the purple. It's actually blank. I don't know if you can understand the HTML on the right side, but it shows that there is no linking to detailed pages and no information after the titles. Since I resized the display, you can also see this is true on the left side.🚩
The killing stroke, however, is the fact that there is no way to place an order.🚩
Apple/Android Apps
It claims to have an app for you to use.
However, those icons are not links, so you have to search both stores. They don't tell you the app's name, so I assumed it's named after their company and searched for "BJC".
Apple's App Store
Nothing there.🚩
Google's App Store
Nothing there, either. I guess they forgot to put their app online? 😉🚩
Statistics
See how those numbers increase so quickly? Well, they never get any larger, and those are some pretty SMALL numbers! It's not pulling data from somewhere, which is what's implied by the increases. If you look at the HTML on the right, you can see that each number is hard-coded into the HTML, meaning that the data is fake.🚩
User Reviews
How remarkable! They have 5-star reviews! But, wait, there's something strange...There are only four and they're all wearing sunglasses?!
Aigars Silkalns
Aigars Silkalns is a real person. Here he is! He's the CEO and sole employee of Colorlib.
Clearly, this sunglasses-wearing fellow is not the CEO of Colorlib.🚩
If that's not convincing. take a look at this! TinEye is a reverse image search engine (like Google's), and it showed me that this is a stock image that was first used to sell sunglasses, and then other products.🚩
Did you notice the last flaw? The images on either side of the "reviewer" are the same woman!🚩
I can't do a name search, nor can I look at company info, since they're far from unique names without company info, but I can still use TinEye!
Jennifer
Aha! Another stock image!🚩
NO?!?! Oh, but wait...The fourth result...
Helen
This one also has the issue of twin images to either side of the "reviewer". So, will this also be a stock image? Place your bets, folks!🚩
Henry smith
Is Henry a transgender or transvestite?🚩 We might never know if it weren't for the fact that it's the same image as Jennifer!🚩 Clearly, they were sloppy AND lazy. At least that saves me time - I don't have to use TinEye!
The Team
Let's not forget the intrepid members of BJC, shall we? Hmmm...I guess the C-Suite leaders are too shy to list themselves like on virtually every other company website I've found a team section/page!🚩
Let's find them on social media, since each one has links to FB, T, G+ and IG when you put the cursor over a photo!
Blank links! Look at the URL I circled and you can see a "#" at the end. That means the link URL hasn't been added and the fact that it goes to this website instead of to Facebook clearly shows us we can't find them on social media.🚩
But TinEye is our friend!
Jackson Nash
What? Can it be? It is! A stock image - and free, too! I'm shocked!🚩
Bart Stewart
Wow - the first incidence of this stock image was on a Spanish psychology website!🚩
Ollie Schneider
No need to search - it's the same woman as Jackson! Twins, perhaps?🚩
Roger West
Well, this picture is popular, and it's certainly a stock image.🚩
Their Phone Number
I tried calling on Saturday night but got no answer. Maybe they took the weekend off...HAHA! So I used the White Pages Reverse Phone Number Lookup to look them up, but there's no name 🚩 or address 🚩 associated with the number.
Their Address
Spoiler alert: They aren't at the address listed!
I looked them up on Google Maps and searched the entire front of this large building, but their name is NOT listed anywhere!🚩
Now, the images are not current, so it is possible that they really ARE located there, because there's a "for lease" sign. These are the businesses I could see.
Oh, but wait, the White Pages Reverse Address Search shows me that Orbus is still in Suite 120!🚩
Conclusion
Over 30 red flags 🚩 later...Based on the fact that there are a lot of red flags and questionable items, this business is very likely to be a scam targeting people looking for telecommute/remote/at home jobs so that they can be robbed. I'm willing to bet that if you could find out the names and addresses of the people who have accepted this job, they are probably sending the packages to each other quite unknowingly, are paying for the shipping and packaging costs (and other expenses) up front and getting a check at the end of the month that bounces, but not before there's been an accounting "error" that gets them to send a check to the company to reimburse the excess they received.
If we take it a step further, this package handling scam could actually be a way for criminals to "launder" packages so that the FBI and other agencies cannot figure out where they go to. Allow me to explain my theory:
- Criminal A packages up their illegal items and ships it to the Dupe #1.
- Dupe #1 repackages it and sends it to Dupe #2.
.
.
.
?. Dupe # X repackages it and sends it to Criminal B. By this time, it has passed through so many hands that there is very little chance that the Feds have tracked it to its destination, effectively erasing the trail and making it hard to use as evidence connecting the two. The only risk is if they get a dupe who opens the packages...
My Actions
I have reported this scam to the FBI and Google. Hopefully, they can work to stop these criminals.
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