Cyber - Criminals Targeting Freelancers

Freelancers are the easy targets to cyber-criminals says Cisco. Their report warns them about work-from-home projects.

Cisco’s 2010 Annual Security Report has been released recently. This report warns that cyber criminals are targeting the unemployed with fraudulent schemes disguised as freelance jobs. It also says that these criminals have stolen financial account information and to convert them as cash they use unemployed people as ‘money mules’.

These ‘job’ usually involves receiving items, repacking them and shipping it abroad. These items have been purchased using stolen financial informations, which the victims don’t know. People search for jobs through legitimate well-known job search sites also have been suffered by these scams.

As the freelancers don’t know they are recruited as money mules, they believe that they are working for a legitimate company. So these “work-at-home” scams are nothing more than recruiting people to serve as money mules for a number of illegal, but very profitable, schemes.

To add another burden to unemployment the job seekers have become easy targets the report warns. So when you look for a project through freelancing, don’t scope for a high return. You may get trapped by cyber - criminals.