A warning about recruitment scams

Thank you for your interest in Innovilage and we are delighted you're considering a career with us. Please be aware that fraudsters sometimes impersonate prominent or deep tech companies - like us and many others - to deceive job seekers. Through the internet, emails, or even telephones, fraudsters may generate official-looking documents, use real employee names and email addresses, or even engage in realistic telephone calls. Intended victims may also be asked to participate in fake interviews, fill out fabricated job applications or even be offered counterfeit offer letters - all with the intention of ultimately getting victims to pay money or divulge sensitive personal information.

How to spot a recruitment scam

• Suspicious communication: Be cautious of unsolicited messages from obscure sources or websites. Our representatives will never contact you from free email providers (i.e. Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook) or unverified platforms. We only ever use our official email addresses (those ending in innovilage.com, innovilage.net, etc.).
• Requests for payment or personal data: We will never ask you to pay any money at any stage of the recruitment process (e.g., for onboarding, training materials, or visa processing). Furthermore, we will never request sensitive information - such as your National Insurance number, date of birth (DoB), passport details, or bank account information - during the initial application phase.
• Unsolicited offers & vague job details: Legitimate communications from us will always contain a specific, clearly defined job opening. Be skeptical of recruiters who claim to have found your CV on a website you do not recognise, or who extend a job offer without a formal interview. If an offer seems too good to be true, it usually is.
• Unusual interview platforms: Interviews are only ever conducted through our approved corporate platforms. We never use public chat rooms or informal apps (i.e. Telegram, WhatsApp, etc.)
• Fraudulent financial transactions: Any payments made by us will come from official corporate accounts. Never trust or cash cheques from any other source(s).

A statement on AI-driven scams

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has significantly changed how we connect online. While AI helps legitimate employers find great talent, scammers are also weaponising these tools to create incredibly sophisticated, error-free deceptions. Traditional warning signs - like poor spelling or clunky phrasing - are often absent in modern scams.

To protect your personal data and digital identity, please keep in mind about these advanced AI tactics and also look out for them:

• Flawless, AI-generated phishing: Fraudsters use generative AI to scrape public professional profiles (like LinkedIn) and write hyper-tailoured, highly convincing job pitches. Never assume a message is genuine simply because it looks polished, uses corporate jargon, or mentions specific details about your career history.
• Deepfake and chat-only interviews: Be wary of interview requests conducted entirely over text-based methods or apps. Furthermore, scammers now use real-time video filters and voice-cloning techniques to impersonate company managers on video calls. If you are on a video interview and notice visual glitches, lip-sync delays, or unusual audio lagging, it may be a deepfake.
• Ghost jobs & data harvesting: Fake job listings - known as ghost jobs - are generated entirely by AI bots to collect CVs, national insurance numbers, and contact details. Always verify that a vacancy is actively listed directly on our official careers portal rather than relying solely on third-party job boards or social media ads.
• Automated task scams: A rapidly growing fraud trend involves being approached via WhatsApp or Telegram for simple, remote "tasks" (e.g. liking videos, rating products, or optimising algorithms) with the promise of quick daily cash. These are automated traps designed to gain your trust before asking you to pay a fee to "unlock" higher earnings, or worse, using your bank account for money laundering.

We will always invite you to a live, interactive interview process with a verified employee using our secure, official corporate channels. We will never rush you, text you out of the blue via WhatsApp to offer a job, or use automated systems to bypass human conversation.

What to do if you suspect a scam

If you suspect that a communication or career opportunity that you have received from Innovilage may not be legitimate, please do not hesitate to contact us at the email addresses listed below:

• [email protected]

Likewise, you are also encouraged to report these incidences to your local police as well as relevant authorities.