Conducting A Safe Search For Internet Jobs

After one of the major job boards reported a major security leak in 2007, you may have become a little bit wary about putting your resume online, for fear that your contact information might be exploited for money-making purposes such as direct mail, email marketing, or identity theft. There are measures you can take, however, to ensure that you're not at risk in your search for Internet Jobs.

You could always just not put your resume on the Internet, right? Well sure, but that's going to put you at a pretty big disadvantage, as a lot of recruiters use the Internet to find candidates, and if it's not there, they can't find you, which means that you will have to be a lot more proactive, monitoring many job boards before you find a position that matches your skill set. It's much easier if the recruiters can find you, and another advantage is that they might be able to tell you about unadvertised jobs. If that's the case, you want to be able to be easily found- so how can you assure you're not opening yourself up to a ton of risk, and that your information will be safe?

First of all, make sure you feel confident posting your resume on a job board. Read their privacy policy and find out if and where the site redistributes your resume do you trust those other sites as well? It may even be a good idea to take a look at the employer side of the site and research their guidelines for resume searchers. The best way to feel totally secure is to email or call the board and get information on their security measures. They want your resume so that employers can search for it, so they'll give you answers.

Once you've done your research and are confident that the boards' privacy policy is sufficient, you must be careful when applying during your internet jobs search and replying to emails. Job boards do a lot to ensure that only valid jobs are posted but it's impossible to monitor every job manually, and inevitably, some jobs will make it "past the filters". So what does this mean for you? It means that you have to be vigilant, and keep a jaded eye out for fishy emails or jobs that sound too good to be true, because as the adage says, it probably isn't true. Under no circumstance should you ever give your vital personal information such as your bank account number or Social Security number. A job board or an employer will never ask for that information via email, and this fact is usually stated explicitly in their privacy policies.

If you do get such an email and know which job board the person found your resume and got your contact information from, it is in everyone's best interest for you to notify the job board with as much information about the scam and person emailing you as possible. You can do the same if you see a fraudulent looking posting. The more aware job boards and the Internet community are of scammers, the more they can help prevent them from scamming you and others.

By knowing where your resume is posted, doing your due diligence in regards to security measures and keeping an eye out for fraud, you can help keep yourself and your personal information safe while conducting a search for Internet jobs.