Signing Up for This Work-at-Home Scam Will Send Your Money Straight to Russia

Chances are you’ve heard of those work-from-home schemes where you can make thousands upon thousands of dollars doing little to no work from the comfort of your own home.

You’ve also probably heard of people getting scammed out of their hard-earned cash by signing up for work-at-home jobs that turn out to be fake.

With unemployment rates at record highs, people are jumping at every opportunity there is to work.

However, one always needs to remember the golden rule: if something appears too good to be true, then it probably is.

Scammers are doing their best to catch folks at their weakest points too – sending out spam messages to lure unsuspecting victims into their web of work-at-home lies.

Here’s an example of a phishing email scammers use to try and get people to sign up for their work-at-home scams:

Re:
From: thorleif Jensen [thorleifjensen63 [at] live.dk]

I netted in $449 in less then a day doing easy things! All thanks to - Career Job Finders trust me, you will be happy

Quote of the Day!

to hear him talk American slang,and whenever I was present,
And then insensibly there came the strange change which I had noticed over the shoulder, a sob in unison, are expressions of sympathy dear

Now, there’s no telling what the random quote at the bottom is about, but what’s to say someone would bother reading past the first line? The [scam] sales pitch has been delivered in the first line.

What happens when you click the link?

Following the link [moneydbsx[dot]tumblr[dot]com/Awurf] will ultimately redirect you to this spoofed website at home54wealth[dot]com:

As you can tell, the cybercrooks have taken their time in creating a webpage that closely resembles a Business Journal website.

In doing this, they hope to build some credibility for their “company” and work-from-home scam – although the page is not without flaws. Notice that at the very bottom, today’s date is missing from the line that’s supposed to create a sense of urgency to sign up.

Easy money? Sign me up!

Clicking the ‘Try it out Today’ button will lead you to the next step, which is a page where the scammer hopes to start capturing some of your information (name, zip & email)  and pretending to lookup available positions in your area.

The scammers have even added the logos of some of the popular news companies – y’know, just in case there’s still a bit of skepticism on whether or not their work-at-home scam is legitimate.

The Available Position "Search"

After you’ve entered your name, zip code, and email address, the website pretends to search for work-at-home positions that are available in your area.

Actually, judging by the view source of the searching page, the scammers have pre-determined that TWO (2) positions are available in every visitor’s area. Isn’t that convenient?

Cool, positions available, now what?

Once the position “search” is done, you’ll be redirected to this mile long page that’s sprinkled with big red lettering, yellow highlighting, more news company logos, testimonials, and whatever other garbage the scammers decided to throw up.

It’s no surprise that near the bottom you start running into ‘Add to Cart’ buttons – after all, what’s a work-at-home scam without a way to sucker people out of their credit card details?

Buying into the work-at-home scam.

By clicking the ‘Add to Cart’ option, you enter into the payment process, first entering your name and clicking to the next page to select your membership plan and choosing your credit card type.

It’s at this point that you finally see the cost to signing up for this particular get-rich-quick scam:

• Unlimited V.I.P Membership to Secret Wealth Formula for only $995.00 $97.00


• Initial start-up specialist consultation for $159.00 $29.95

Aren’t you just thinking, “OHH, SWEET! I’M SAVING SOOO MUCH MONEY SIGNING UP FOR THIS!”

I mean, how could you resist making as much as $8,7000 per month?! That’s not highly unlikely, right? After all, this strange website claims you can! [/sarcasm]

Well, unfortunately for anyone that actually falls into this wide open trap, the chances of you making any money is highly unlikely.

As it turns out, doing a WHOIS search for the domain for this website will reveal that the domain is registered to someone in Russia.

It appears as though this particular scammer is keeping busy by spamming people with emails that link to this scam and constantly changing the name of the scam whenever people start blowing the whistle on it.

Although this work-at-home scheme is currently named “The Secret Wealth Formula”, it may have previously been known as “Home Wealth Formula”.

Don't fall for a work-at-home scam like this one!

Spotting a work-at-home scam isn’t hard as work-at-home scams usually:

• Requires payment in advance to sign-up/join, pay for software or other various materials.  Keep in mind that in the US, the Federal Trade Commission states that under no circumstances should someone have to pay in order to get a job.


• Are originating from some location overseas. Like the scam outlined above? Based in Russia. Yeah, good luck getting your money back on that one.


• Have websites that are littered with spelling & grammatical errors. Let’s not mention the emails that may be going back and forth between you and your “employer”.


• Don’t require experience or skills, but offer high income. There’s a reason people pursue a good education.


• Feature a company name that cannot be verified. Can’t find any information on the company they’re supposedly a part of? That’s probably because it doesn’t really exist.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – if something sounds too good to be true then it probably is!

Have you fallen for a work-at-home scam?

If you’ve signed up for this work-at-home scam – or another get-rich-quick scheme – you can file a complaint with one of these organizations:

• The Federal Trade Commission by going to ftc.gov/complaint or calling 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357).


•  The Attorney General’s office in your state or the state where the company is located. Visit naag.org; the office will be able to tell you whether you’re protected by any state law that may regulate work-at-home programs.


• Your local consumer protection offices.


• Your local Better Business Bureau at bbb.org.

Don’t fall for work-at-home scams, folks!

[UPDATE 10/12: Tumblr has shut down the blog that is advertised in spam emails by the scammers. Thanks, Tumblr! If you see another blog being used in scams, feel free to send an email to Tumblr at support@tumblr.com & request to have it disabled.]

Dollar sign photo credit: Jim Legans, Jr