Monday, May 3, 2010

Scammers -Festiva, FAMINU and Viniva

I have had many dealings in the online community in the last few years, be it from social communications, job searches and housing searches. That means that I have also had my share of experiences with scammers, even the Nigerians. This newest one, however, is going to hit and hurt a lot of people who, in this job market, are desperate for a job.
I applied for a position that was listed on Craigslist and received a reply e-mail within ten minutes, at 10:45pm. It was sent from a Blackberry which suggested to me that they had not even read my resume, but they were inviting me to interview the next morning. This came from FESTIVA RESORTS (http://www.festiva.travel/). I found this article during my skeptical search and was not interested in them even if there was a job. They are ripping people off with fake timeshares and I sure couldn't be a part of it.

The second company, or two companies, are a bit more serious. I sent another resume out from Craigslist and received a reply the next day, saying this:
Hello A*******,



Thank you for submitting your resume for our receptionist position.



We have been getting a lot of applications for this opening, but I am happy to let you know that I have reviewed your resume and it looks good.



Before I can set you up with the final interview, you need to complete a short personality screening, which can be found at our web site.


Your resume has been assigned with a personal application code which is: XXXXX



Please go to http://faminu.com/jobs/receptionist/ enter your code and complete the personality screening, so we can progress with the application process.



Thank you in advance and have a great day!



Best regards,

Jeremy Timmons

Faminu


I clicked the link and saw that it asked for a copy of my credit score and if I didn't have a copy to upload, I could click another link where I could obtain one (I don't know what happens when you click the link to get your credit score. It may have been spam or virus, who knows. I didn't click it).
I started searching again and found their site (http://faminu.com/), which offers no information, and I found the much more telling information on Whois. If you don't know Whois, you should. Unless you're an actual creepy stalker, so I won't tell you any more. But Whois gave this info. Basically the company is in the Bahamas, has been moved around the net and had been on several servers over a short amount of time. Without the Whois information, it would have been harder to get info on Faminu because they are a coverup for another company called Viniva, which has been targeted for scamming before. People were sent the exact e-mail that I got, but from Viniva.

Also, for those in New Orleans area, there are often posts on Craigslist warning about job offers from Bruno Inc, a real estate company. He has been scamming home buyers and even companies- at some point he sold an apartment complex in Metairie that he didn't own. He operates under a few other company names, but they're usually listed together. So I would also suggest being cautious about renting from him/his company as well as any job offers he has.

I advise that everyone be cautious when using online resources and pay close attention to the information you receive from smoeone. If you feel like something's wrong, chances are, it is.

2 comments:

  1. I answered a craigslist employment posting yesterday and received the same letter as you. Job position was supposed to be in the Orlando area. I didn't put any info. in the link just started googling and found your post.

    Thank you

    ReplyDelete
  2. Glad I could help. I would really hate for someone to get screwed over. Good luck!

    ReplyDelete