A documented five-year climb
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the US consumer-protection authority, tracks this type of fraud year by year. The trend is clear: total reported losses went from $90 million in 2020 to $501 million in 2024 — more than a fivefold increase. In Q4 2025 alone, the FTC tallied $150.4 million in losses across 25,002 reports.
The signal confirmed by a second body
The Better Business Bureau (BBB), a US consumer-mediation organization, published a study in May 2026 confirming the same trend independently: employment-fraud reports doubled in 2025 compared with the previous year, with 23,234 reports logged through its tracking tool (BBB Scam Tracker).
Why this channel has shifted
A fake job offer historically arrived by email — a fake recruiter, a fake company, an address that didn't match the official domain. The verification reflex was built around that email. The shift toward text and messaging apps changes things: fewer visual cues to check a domain, more perceived urgency ("reply fast, the role is filling up"), and a channel where the victim is used to receiving informal messages from real professional contacts.
Frequently asked questions
How much does recruitment fraud cost on average?
According to the FTC, the median loss per victim is $2,000. Total reported losses went from $90 million in 2020 to $501 million in 2024.
What channel does a fake job offer usually arrive through?
Increasingly by text or messaging apps rather than email — a channel where the usual checks (looking up the company, checking the email domain) are harder to do.
How can you spot a fake job offer?
Warning signs: unsolicited contact, being hired without a real interview, being asked to pay for equipment or training, or being asked to cash a check and send back part of the money.
Other markets we cover
The FTC's numbers describe the US, but the same fake job offer — recruited by text, paid through "tasks," or charged an upfront fee — is climbing just as fast elsewhere.
🇦🇺Australia — reports and losses more than doubled in 2025
Scamwatch recorded 4,461 job-scam reports in 2025, with losses exceeding AU$14 million, up from 3,349 reports and AU$13.7 million in 2024 — a 102.4% jump the National Anti-Scam Centre attributes largely to fake listings on social media. A dedicated Job Scam Fusion Cell, running from September 2024 to March 2025, brought government, police and industry together to disrupt the networks behind it.
National Anti-Scam Centre (ACCC), 2025; HRD Australia.🇬🇧United Kingdom — £200,000 lost across seven victims in one Hertfordshire cluster
In June 2025, Hertfordshire Police tallied more than £200,000 in losses across seven residents of Cheshunt, Watford, Hemel Hempstead, Hitchin and St Albans — two of them £70,000 each — after fraudsters posing as recruiters contacted them by WhatsApp or text and had them complete "tasks" through an app, withholding payout until victims topped up their own funds. UK-wide, recruitment scams cost victims over £17 million in 2025.
Hertfordshire Police, reported by HemelToday, June 2025; Watch Your Pocket.🇨🇦Canada — losses quadrupled to $49 million in a single year
The Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre logged over 2,300 reports and more than $49 million lost to job and employment scams in 2024, up from roughly $7 million in 2022. The first quarter of 2025 alone brought in $22.7 million in reported losses. Recruiters increasingly target newcomers with fake job offers tied to fabricated Labour Market Impact Assessment documents, charging thousands of dollars in upfront "paperwork" fees for permits that don't exist.
Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre, cited by Daily Hive and Money.ca, 2025.🇮🇳India — fake government appointment letters across 40+ departments
In January 2026, India's Enforcement Directorate raided around 15 locations across six states in a probe into a fake recruitment scheme spanning more than 40 government organizations, from Indian Railways to the Income Tax Department — fraudulent appointment letters, some backed by two to three months of real salary payments to look convincing. Separately, over 4,000 complaints were filed against illegal recruiting agents between 2021 and mid-2024, many tied to fake overseas job offers. Families with a relative recruited abroad are frequent targets of this same fraud; see our report on scams targeting diaspora families.
WION News, January 2026; Ministry of External Affairs data via New Lines Magazine.Go further
Egidio — The Threat Laboratory, "Recruitment fraud: the fake job offer that costs real money", egidio.app/en/laboratoire/recruitment-fraud/. Licensed CC BY 4.0.
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