Meridian Business Support is urging candidates to be wary of job posts and offers they come across via email and social media following a surge in fraudulent recruitment activity online.

The warning comes as scammers have been reported to be sending out fake emails and social media posts containing job adverts and offers using falsified Meridian branding, including similar email addresses and social media profiles. Mark Mitchell, chief executive of Meridian Business Support, says: “A number of falsified emails and job posts have been brought to our attention that have been crafted by fraudsters using the Meridian Business Support name and identical company branding.

Currently, we are aware that one email address being used to impersonate a Meridian Business Support consultant is resourcing@meridianbis.com. We can confirm that this is not an official Meridian Business Support email address. These phony job posts and offers are very sophisticated and significant effort has been made by the scammers to fool candidates. It is important that candidates do not respond to any items that they believe may be fraudulent. Should there be any doubt over the authenticity of a correspondence, then we are urging those that view these posts not to engage with them using any means.

We strongly advise that anyone who receives these false solicitations to either safely delete them or report to Action Fraud by visiting http://www.actionfraud.police.uk/report_fraud.” According to SAFERjobs, a voluntary organisation that combats and raises awareness of criminal behaviour affecting the recruitment sector, 70,000 jobseekers fall victim to job scams every month with 19-24 year olds most likely to fall victim.