RALEIGH, N.C. – With holiday hiring in full swing and people looking for work-from-home opportunities, more scams have popped up, targeting job seekers.

According to the Federal Trade Commission, financial losses from “gamified job scams,” in which participants are asked to repeat sets of tasks to supposedly earn money, exceeded $220 million in the first half of 2024.

Alyssa Parker with the Better Business Bureau of the Carolinas is urging applicants to stay vigilant.

“We just want consumers and people that are looking for jobs to be on the lookout for that and really be aware that a lot of these scams are happening,” she said.

Parker highlighted several warning signs of a potential job scam, particularly in online job offers.

"Any job that is saying, 'You don’t even need to submit a résumé or you can have this job right away…' that's typically a red flag," she said. "If you're getting an offer very easily, that is typically a red flag."

To avoid falling victim, Parker suggests doing research on the company offering the job.

"Try to find the website directly. You can look up what you know about the company," she said. "Also, a good old-fashioned Google search, as well as a Google image search, to see if the company address is actually where they say it is, is really helpful."

If you've already shared personal information with a potential scammer, Parker recommends taking immediate action.

"Try to contact your bank or your credit card company, or if you gave any personal information out, make sure that you try to contact those appropriate parties," she said.

Despite these precautions, she said recovering money lost to these scams can be challenging.

"It's really difficult to recover any sort of money if you just give it away," she said. "So it's really important to try to do that research ahead of time so you don’t end up falling victim."

With the holidays approaching, Parker urged job seekers to be particularly cautious.

"A lot of people are losing a lot of money to this," she said.