Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

I recently had a person using my photo and work experience to get side gigs on Upwork. A customer of theirs contacted me directly for help which is how I found out about it.

Upwork removed the profile after some prodding. I feel like I should report identity theft to the police or something but I don't know if it's worth the bother?

https://twitter.com/donatj/status/1529266972403585024



Yes, you should report it: this person committed multiple crimes, and Upwork has a duty to avoid facilitating fraud.


Reporting it is only worth it to have a paper trail in case the identity theft then brings you into legal trouble such as taking out credit in your name, etc. If they’re only using publicly-available info I wouldn’t bother.


Why do this at all when websites such as https://this-person-does-not-exist.com/en already exist?

Available for anyone to take and utilize. I have a (hidden) suspicion that a greater proportion of LinkedIn's reported "active users" are, in fact, a group of people with these profile images and fraudulent profiles.


I think part of it is Upwork let's you just point a new profile at ANY LinkedIn profile and import it. I suspect they just pointed it at mine and were off to the races.


Maybe it helps in the hiring process to have a real person's history?




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: