Scammers are sending job scam emails to student email addresses. These emails are designed to trick students into applying for jobs that require students to provide personal information and potentially engage in criminal activity. Please confirm all employers and representatives with UH University Career Services before corresponding via email or phone. 

If you have responded to an email regarding a job opportunity and you now suspect it to be a scam, please do the following:

1. Notify Information Security at security@uh.edu or 832-842-4695. You will be asked to forward your PeopleSoft ID and any email or text message correspondence you have had with the scammer.
2. To help secure your UH information, please set up your PeopleSoft password security questions (if you have not already) and then reset your PeopleSoft and CougarNet account passwords:

3. Report the scam to the UH Police Department, 4051 Wheeler Avenue Houston, TX 77204 or by phone at 713-743-3333. Inform them that Information Security asked you to make the report.

There are many ways to identify a job scam email:

• The email is unsolicited - you did not contact the company about the job. Legitimate companies do not send generic, unsolicited emails about job opportunities.
• The email is from a Gmail, Yahoo, or Outlook address. Legitimate companies should email from their corporate email account. UH will not post jobs from employers that do not have corporate email accounts.
• The email does not address you by name. The email may say your information was obtained from a job board, school database, or Career Services office. If so, they should address the email to you directly, rather than “Hello Student” or “Good Morning”.
• They ask to continue the conversation with an alternative email, not your UH email. This prevents UH email protections from identifying the scam email.
• They ask to continue the conversation by text. This makes the scam harder to document. Conversations about legitimate offers should be conducted by email.
• They ask for personal information in an email or include a link to a Google docs form. Legitimate job opportunities require you to apply and provide your personal information in an official application on the company website.
• The email contains grammatical or spelling errors. A very common attribute of scam emails is that they do not bother to spell check or grammar check their outgoing emails.
• There is no contact information for the sender. Any legitimate email from a company’s Human Resources or Recruiting department should have a signature line with the sender's name, title, and contact information.
• The email asks you to visit a non-UH website. UH will only ask you to visit the website for an official career center on campus.

If you receive an email that contains this type of information, delete it.  There is no need to respond.  If you ever have questions about whether or not an email is legitimate, forward it to security@uh.edu.

Decision Flowchart - Scam or Opportunity

Examples of Job Scam Emails

From: <redacted@CougarNet.UH.EDU>
Subject: Re: 08/05/2022

To Whom it may concern,

I am sharing a job information to students who might be interested in a UNICEF part-time job
to make up to $500 weekly.

Attached is further information about the employment schedule, if interested kindly contact
Dr. Michael Schmitt with your alternative email (Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail Aol, etc) and not your Edu email for urgent employement.

Note: This is strictly a work from home position.

Regards

University of Houston
Careers and Internships Services

***********************************************************************************

From: <redacted@CougarNet.UH.EDU>
Sent: Monday, August 8, 2022 3:18 PM
Subject: DEAR STUDENT

Dear Student,

Are you seeking flexible hours for a remote part time job ?
Are you self-motivated and able to work from home or school?
Here is an amazing virtual job position that pays over 500 weeklies!!!
APPLY NOW to read more about this great opportunity and how to Apply.

Job seekers should not hesitate to apply for this job, We have students who are working already; more workers are needed urgently.

*********************************************************************************

From: <redacted@CougarNet.UH.EDU>
Sent: Monday, August 8, 2022 3:36 PM
Subject: PLEASE REGISTER

You are invited to participate in a Part-time work offer for current students and staff. In delivery of your duty within your local community, You would be expected to provide an outstanding level of service delivery and earn up to $450 weekly As an equal opportunity employer, application is open to all. If this sounds like the role for you and you would like to learn more about what we have to offer, then please register .