What You Need to Know in 2025
Many people have either been scammed by fake online job offers or received SMS or WhatsApp messages offering what appears to be a well-paid position by reviewing apps, promoting hotel deals, reviewing jewellery or other work-from-home opportunities. Cybertrace played a leading role in exposing many of the scam domains identified during our investigations. Our forensic investigations identified the operators as likely of Chinese nationality. These scammers were later linked to the notorious forced labour pig butchering scams that have been reported in mainstream media in recent times. Learn how our job scam investigators assisted with shutting down call centres in 2024.
Why Did Job Scams from China Decline in 2024?
From a combination of intelligence sharing and specialist investigation by police and private job scam investigators, police in several South-East Asian countries such as Thailand, Cambodia and Myanmar raided several large job scam and pig butchering operations. The police action ultimately shut down many, but not all of the operations. It was reported that thousands of captive individuals were rescued during the raids. These raids had several impacts, either directly shutting down the scam operations or encouraging other operations to either temporarily shut down or relocate to another country.
What Impact Did These Actions Have on Job Scams?
Cybertrace is aware that the arrested individuals did not include the Ultimate beneficiaries, senior members and funders who were responsible for orchestrating the scam operations. This appeared to conclude these scam operations in the latter half of 2024 (we are generally referring to the ‘fake job’ scam business model, however, we acknowledge that many other Chinese scam operations continued to operate).
How Are Chinese Job Scammers Operating Now?
From late 2024 and into early 2025, Cybertrace was contacted by multiple scam victims who described scamming activities as almost identical to the former fake job scams. This included the website infrastructure, website style and scam methodology.
What Methods Are Scammers Using to Lure Victims?
Based on reports to Cybertrace, the scammers continue to contact individuals via WhatsApp, and now it appears the scammers are targeting certain ethnic groups in Australia. However, overall, the methods used by fake job scammers remain relatively the same as in 2023-2024. In one way this makes it easier for job scam investigators to identify the associated websites and operators, the reemergence of job scams in 2025 is concerning.
How Has Technology Helped Scammers Re-emerge?
As with any modern business operating in the pseudo-technology space, regular off-site backups allow the operators to relaunch digital resources quickly and easily should the systems go down for any reason.
Cybertrace is aware that many large scam operations have physical or digital ‘kill switches’ connected to their digital infrastructure hosted in their scam call centres. This means that when needed, the operators can simply press a button which will quickly backup and disconnect the physical devices (PCs) in their call centres to their cloud hosting services. As most documents and related systems are hosted via cloud services, the evidence potentially accessible by authorities is disconnected from the device leaving very little evidence for police to use in subsequent prosecutions. In the same regard, the offsite operators can quickly redeploy their operations anywhere in the world with minimal disruption.
Who Are the Most Common Targets of Chinese-Based Job Scams?
Cybertrace as specialist job scam investigators are aware that most Western countries are being targeted. For Australian victims, Cybertrace has observed that, in 10 recent Chinese scam reports, 6 of the victims were first-generation Indian immigrants residing in Australia. The remainder are a mix of Australians of various descent. It remains unclear whether this suggests that Indian residents in Australia are being specifically targeted, are more susceptible to victimisation, or a combination of both factors. Either way, Cybertrace recommends that Indian Australians increase their cyber literacy and be made aware of this specific scam type to reduce their vulnerability to such fraudulent schemes.
Why Are Job Seekers Vulnerable to These Scams?
Job seekers are more vulnerable to Job scams as they are actively looking for work and are likely to act on instructions from a potential employer, especially if the conditions and pay are in line with or exceed expectations.
Are Certain Countries More at Risk Than Others?
All English-speaking Western countries are at risk as are the primary target of the scammers. In most situations, the scam websites identified by Cybertrace are in English and Western countries are being targeted due to their higher wages and standards of living.
What Are the Warning Signs of a Job Scam?
In the majority of cases, unsolicited contact is made via WhatsApp or SMS offering a work opportunity. This is the biggest red flag, as it’s simply not how employers contact potential employees; especially in Australia where WhatsApp is not as commonly used as in other Western countries.
How Can You Spot a Fake Job Offer?
The next step in the victimisation process is that the victim is asked on WhatsApp if they can send them the job description and that the victim’s details will be forwarded to a recruiter for further progression. This is designed to add a sense of professional process flow and legitimise the contact. The scammer occasionally steers the victim to a WhatsApp group where other apparent job seekers are chatting about their roles. This is all fabricated and the other job seekers are actually scammers as well.
An example of the information sent to victims via WhatsApp, the following is common.
We currently have part-time and full-time jobs, age requirement 22+
💼Job scope
Optimize Data (Non-technical)
📍Requirement
Own a Device with network
🕛Time & Venue
Own time own target, work remotely
Over 22 years old
💰Salary Package
Basic salary + commission system
Part Time – 1000GBP- 2000GBP Five Days
Full Time – 10000GBP- 30000GBP Thirty Days
What Should You Do If You Suspect a Scam?
Firstly, check the website for the job offer on Cybertrace’s ScamID to identify scam risk. ScamID is a state-of-the-art scam website detector. Also, if you have already sent money to the scammers, any platform that they may be using as part of the scam contains fake data. If it indicates that you have a certain amount of money owing to you, it is not real. Do not send any more money to them regardless of what they tell you, they are very convincing. They will no doubt tell you that you need to spend a certain amount of money to be eligible to withdraw your funds or that you need to pay tax. This is all part of the scam designed to get every last dollar from you.
The next step is to report this scam to Cybertrace, your local police (or other reporting body for your country) and your bank. Engaging a job scam investigator early may be crucial to your case.
This will vary from country to country, however, there is a wealth of information on the internet for reporting scams in various countries. For information on how to report a scam in Australia, please read our article here.
For job scams, the offenders use a different business model from other scams such as cryptocurrency or other investment fraud that targetsd high-worth individuals. Job scams are generally lower loss, higher frequency which means there are more victims with lower losses.
These cases are less likely to be investigated by the authorities due to the low individual loss amounts. However, Cybertrace can assist victims as a private scam investigation provider. Victims can engage Cybertrace to investigate their cases where the Police won’t assist. However, it is important to note that recovering money lost to a job-related fraud is a highly complex and difficult situation with a low chance of recovery. If any investigations company guarantees to get your money back, they are likely a fake as well.
Yes, job scams are operated by highly coordinated criminal organisations, usually linked to the Chinese mafia. Based on the intelligence available to Cybertrace, job scams lure victims with promises of domestic or foreign work opportunities, only to trap them in forced labour, modern slavery, or exploitative conditions. Organised crime groups coordinate these schemes to exploit vulnerable individuals.
If you have been affected by a job scam, contact Cybertrace. Our team may be able to help identify the offenders, determine their location, and collaborate with authorities to bring them to justice. In some situations, an assets recovery operation may be possible.
