Sharif King was recently indicted in New York on fifteen charges related to allegations that he operated an identity theft scheme in which he posted advertisements for job openings for “Upstate Family Transport LLC” and then required a job applicant to provide him with personal information including his  Social Security number under the guise of needing the information for employment purposes, but instead used the information to steal the job applicant’s identity and purchased a $58,000 Mercedes Benz using his victim’s identity.  Just last June, King was charged in a similar scheme in which he allegedly interviewed job applicants for a non-existent record label “Dower Music Entertainment LLC” and then used the information provided by the job applicants to obtain credit cards.

TIPS

Always do research on any company for which you are considering working to make sure that they are legitimate.  Find out if they have a physical address and see if they have any history of fraud.  It is also important to remember that no prospective employer needs your Social Security number until you have been hired for the job and you should also restrict the amount of other personal information, such as your birth date or driver’s license number that you provide a prospective employer that are not needed early in the job application process or ever, in many instances.