Uploading the Curriculum Vitae (CV), and, therefore, personal information on large platforms, is a common practice for people trying to join the labor market. However, many of them do so without knowing the cyber risks that this can entail: from fake profiles and messages, to links that redirect to suspicious websites.
The last semi-annual transparency report carried out by LinkedIn, between January 1 and June 30, 2022 and carried out to collect actions that violate its policies and conditions, detected that 16.4 million fake accounts were blocked during registration and 190,000 were restricted from the complaint of members.
Although cyber security risks on these platforms are rare, these figures are alarming, since they are increasing every 6 months, which is why experts call for greater alertness when job searches are carried out.
Much caution
“As in any social media, on these platforms there are false profiles for malicious purposes. Usually, these belong to large organizations, with studies in prestigious educational centers and other characteristics that seem to be too good to be true. The way they operate is by sending messages where they show interest in our profiles and later ask us to apply on other platforms, to provide additional information or to organize a call to collect more data. For many, these ways of operating are well known, however, for others it can be a trick that is difficult to perceive, especially because it is something emotional when you are constantly looking for a job”, explained Sebastián Sack, VP of Latin America at Noventiq.
Whether they are fake personal or organizational profiles, the reasons why these accounts exist are many, from conducting open source intelligence (OSINT), that is, research that uses public sources of information, such as social networks, to attacks more sophisticated that make use of artificial intelligence with the aim of stealing information from organizations of interest. All profiles are exposed to seeing their security violated, so certain precautions must be taken.
Recently, the International Labor Organization (ILO) in its World Employment and Social Outlook report, published in January 2023, has warned that workers around the world will be forced to accept lower-quality jobs as a result of the slowdown that will take place this year, added to the fact that the growth rate of employment will be only 1%.
These figures and statements add additional weight to a search process, which for many is already a tiring and desperate activity, which over time turns into applications to all kinds of companies without even corroborating the profile.
Protection of personal information
In order to safeguard personal or professional information, Noventiq highlights the following tips:
Email address- a critical piece of information for both a business and an attacker. It should be avoided that it is the same associated with banking platforms or other important applications, and in the event of an attack, ask yourself if you are prepared to identify phishing.
National Identity Document- the use of this information is very rare, but it continues to exist, however, its relevance is null until reaching the hiring process.
Telephone number- At this point it is essential that the telephone number be used under double authentication factor (2AF)
Exact address- A data not necessary for the labor market, an approximation can be given instead.
“With everything shared, we do not seek to ignore all messages, emails or job offers, on the contrary, we want to encourage a safer search where the necessary precautions are taken to avoid being a victim of malicious attacks. It is essential to raise awareness and keep all users alert, both large corporations and anyone who uses these applications”, they concluded from Noventiq.
