Scammers are creatively offering cash for your participation in their survey and there is an abundance of these scams focused around the COVID-19 pandemic. Be vigilant to check for common red flags such as grammatical errors and spacing issues. Scammers often will use the name of a Wake Forest employee, but have a mismatched or generic Gmail address, instead of a legitimate WFU address. Do not respond and do not give your personal information.
Example:
Subject: PART-TIME SURVEY
Take a COVID 19 survey and evaluate the services of a few local outlets on how they adhere to COVID 19 protective protocols and get paid $180 1hr: 30minutes every week. This will be done at your own leisure time within the week. You will also be required to procure and purchase some PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) which will be distributed locally to help cushion the spread of COVID-19 in the process of completing the tasks.
Note: you will be provided with funds to make the purchases and It will not be from your personal funds.
Kindly write back if interested. You will be guided and also provided with more information on how to proceed.
Forward suspicious emails to infosec@wfu.edu, and the InfoSec team will investigate the email and can help you decide if it is indeed a scam.
Review Security Essentials to learn more about keeping yourself safe.