Fiverr Forum

Scam warning people asking to buy Upwork accounts

#1

Within two days I’ve had two different people contact me wanting me to make or buy my existing Upwork account so that they can pose as American’s to get jobs on Upwork.

Both will request that you talk to them on a different platform or app. the first one had me do a ■■■■■ call which I got to listen to a guy in poor English make a spill how he represents a group of engineers in Japan and how they cannot get American clients so he wants me to make an account on Upwork they can use.

Second person sent me an image with 4 different method to talk to him/her this time I did discord, the person asked to buy my Upwork account in a similar fashion as the first one and when I tried to relate the two the person said they had no relation even though a good 50% was the exact same wording as the first one and both were Japanese.

From what I can see I am getting targeted because I fall in the new user category since I just made an account a few days ago.

6 Likes
#2

I’ve gotten this a number of times. I don’t even bother responding. I block, report as SPAM and send the conversation straight to the trash can.

4 Likes
#3

Setting up a verified account requires sending actual identification to Upwork for them look at to know if the person is who they say they are so it isn’t as simple as just paying someone to make an account and is closer to identity fraud if anyone falls for doing what they ask and could lead to actual criminal charges to the person selling the account.

Makes me wonder if they are just after the personal information for identity theft rather than the account since they should know about the required ID and might be after that ID instead.

2 Likes
#4

Hello @luneder

Welcome to Fiverr. Thank you for the info about the scammers.

Have a good time in Gorums.

1 Like
#5

Please keep in mind that contact outside of Fiverr is strictly forbidden (it’s in Fiverr’s Terms of Service). You have now violated these terms twice.

3 Likes
#6

Not really, that line is so the site can say it is out of their hands if anything happens and the one actually in trouble is the person directing to those other platforms since it means they have intent to break terms of service.

I knew both were scams and just played along to see what they were after before reporting the accounts which are now banned I may add and I even mentioned when reporting them that I played along to see what they were after. Freelance long enough and you actually look forward to these poor attempts at scams to laugh at them.

1 Like
#7

Sellers have been banned for accepting to contact people outside of Fiverr.

3 Likes
#8

Hello, where did you get that idea? It applies to anyone who contacts or has contact with someone from the site outside of the site. People get banned every day for any type of contact such as responding to a request for outside contact by accepting and doing it.

Any time someone wants outside contact with you report them. Do not go ahead and do it. It’s never going to be to your advantage. It’s always going to be someone trying to scam you.

#9

Scammers scammers everywhere:crazy_face:!

1 Like
#10

80% of my messages are this exact Upwork scam. It sucks because I think I got a new gig but just ends up being a scammer. Fiverr should really figure out how to get rid of this scamming nonsense

1 Like
#11

It comes in waves. I’ve had 4 messages from our dear friend “Lee from China” a week ago, now everything’s quiet on that front again.

1 Like
#12

They can’t really do anything since they attach the real message as an image, so Fiverr can’t detect it.

What we can do is to report them when we receive such a message.

1 Like
#13

Image is the recent development. Before that, it was a link, and before that, they were sending documents as attachments.

1 Like
#14

Lee from China sent me two messages last week. He sent two in a row, within a minute of each other, from two different accounts.

#15

So in 2 months I have had 40-50 people on different accounts send me messages saying they will buy my Upwork account.

This kind of implies the site isn’t in good condition if the spam has become that much of a dominating force with no sign of decline. While I am sure being a new user account might be why I am getting hit with so many that also means everyone who makes a new account will also be hit likely chasing them away.

1 Like
#16

It won’t chase away anyone but those who are quitters. It’s a small inconvenience, nothing more.

I do feel bad for anyone who falls for it. But they are violating fiverr’s terms of service if they respond outside of fiverr so in a way it’s self regulating.

I can’t even imagine anyone saying “oh this is so terrible I have to quit!”

#17

miss there really isn’t a lot of work to get off this site. It is all very specific stuff and most of them are exploitative. Plus this site takes 20% of the profit as a flat rate that does not change unlike other sites that have thresholds that cut that percentage way down. I spent some time yesterday doing some research and this place is almost dead with the stock value cut in half in a year period that is still headed down, all reviews are negative with several agencies threatening to shut the place down, and the user population is on a decline.

This site works similar to a pyramid scheme where the first person or people closest to the top will always make more than the people who come later. This site due to how levels work and how older accounts will almost always be the first on the list of gigs with new accounts having almost no chance of getting worth while work is very close to how a pyramid scheme works. Pyramid schemes are illegal in most countries.

#18

@luneder Sir, I’ve been on this site for 7 years. My experience in all these years has been nothing like what you are describing.

This site is what you make of it. Nothing more, nothing less.

Freelancing on the internet is not right for everyone. Not everyone can succeed. Not everyone can get sales. But a lot of people do get sales, from day one, and continue to get them. It’s all up to you.

There aren’t many places where someone in a third world country can earn $28,000 a month. They can do that here. There aren’t many places where a lady who specializes in writing resumes can earn over $20,000 a month and usually much more. Here someone is doing that.

This site is simply a platform for people to show what they can do. Some make the most of it. Some can’t do it.

You created some gigs. How much did fiverr charge you to put your gigs on their site? And did fiverr take down your negative comments about it? No, you got to advertise for free. You got to criticize fiverr without any type of censorship, right on their site.

So you should be grateful to have this opportunity, which cost you nothing. So make the most of it, it’s all up to you. No one is preventing you from getting sales. That’s up to you.

You have a gig called “I will make high quality character concepts” or something like that. Do you think many people are doing a search for character concepts? I don’t. The title of your gigs is how they are listed and indexed and if you don’t use terms and words people are looking for, no one will see your gigs.

That is just one example of how you might be failing to get sales.

There is no reason for you not to get sales from what I’ve seen of your gigs aside from not having a searchable word, even one, in your titles.

Also you need some reviews and your prices, for your second and third packages, are prohibitive for a brand new seller.

2 Likes
#19

Uh oh! Thanks for the heads up! Been getting alot of those.

1 Like
#20

To be honest here, if I’d received 30 spam messages a month when I first joined, I’d question the legitimacy of the entire enterprise as well. Especially if these were the only messages was receiving.

I don’t know why fiverr doesn’t want to or can’t do anything about it but it’s not a good look and shouldn’t be treated as a minor inconvenience along the way. Especially when fiverr has made such an effort to look and operate more legit.

There are people that come from established accounts on other platforms, find the issue unacceptable and turn away. Has nothing to do with them giving up. Has everything to do with having trouble to treat fiverr seriously.

I’ve heard this “fiverr is dead” talk ever since I’ve joined.

I’d love them to implement this. I have buyers I’m 50-80+ orders in and I’d appreciate paying 10% as a “thank you” for making them come back to work with me specifically the way u p w o r k does it.

But on the other hand, U p w o r k makes you pay for connections. You’re paying just to be considered and even an interview isn’t guaranteed. U p w o r k also literally turns your account off for “not making money” for them for some time.