When a job isn't really a job

I have personally recruited into the Cyber Security industry for 15 years and I have sadly witnessed a significant number of companies posting fake jobs across the various platforms, especially over 2020.

I wanted to explain some of the different types of fake jobs, why they exist and how you can qualify them quickly.

An algorithm reposting old jobs from companies that no longer exist. At the time of writing this article there is a part time Payroll Administrator for 2e2 in the UK. That company doesn't exist in the UK, something isn’t quite right here.

Companies (not recruiters) posting job advert to collecting candidate applications for potential future employment. Often stating they are creating a pool of candidates.
- This is a grey area as personal data should not be kept longer than is necessary for the particular purpose for which it is being retained. How, where, why and for how long is the data being held?

Less than legitimate recruiters posting a fake jobs to attract candidate CV’s so they can pitch them out to the market. Imagine the impression if one or more ‘recruiter’ sends your CV out to the same companies.

I don’t actively use job boards, however the www.DCLsearch.com is indexed / scrapped, probably via google, and some of our roles are posted on the various job board platforms. No idea why or how and I certainly don’t pay for it.

Other recruitment businesses post jobs on their website to make it look like they are busy. Those jobs are indexed / scrapped and also posted on job boards- Their replies go un answered as they don’t exit.

A company is hiring but has a purple squirrel wish list as long as your arm and aren’t exactly clear what they want. Can be a waste of time.

The simplest and often quickest way to clarify if a role is real is is to call the company that is advertising for the position. Being proactive will give you a better chance in being selected for interview then just waiting for the internal HR team to sift through the many hundreds of applications.

If you have any other tips please do comment and share.