If you are a freelance translator or interpreter, you have received your fair share of emails requesting your services. While the scope and details of the project can vary, the objective for you as a translator or interpreter always remains the same—to provide your expert services and get paid for them. In an ideal world, every request you receive is perfectly legitimate and are genuinely asking for your assistance, but that is unfortunately not always the case. In this day and age, where it is increasingly encouraged for all of us to be connected via the internet, it is very easy to try and connect with someone even if you have never met them before.

This is both a blessing and a curse. Though you may be able to connect with someone who needs your services, you may also attract someone who is just trying to scam you into giving them access to your personal information so that they can make some easy money. Fortunately, there are ways to try and stop scams before they get too far, and make sure that you are able to continue working without having to worry about whether or not a potential client is just someone looking to scam you. In the beginning, they might appear to just be normal customers, but if something sounds suspicious to you during your communication with them, then you should stop communication and then they will stop as well.

First, some of the most recognizable scams are those that list illogical arguments or deals that are too good to be true. Either way, you should always be cautious of any suspicious links or files that are sent to you. If you are suspicious of something, do not open it. This is easier sometimes in the more recognizable scams. For example, if someone contacts you with an offer for translation services, but they need your bank account number so that they can directly deposit the payment, and they send you a link so that you can do so, then that should already be sounding off alarm bells in your head. If anyone asks for personal information, then you should begin to be weary of them. You should either just not respond at all or say that you are not available for their assignment, and move on.

If something sound too good to be true, you should also be cautious of whether or not it is a scam. While a juicy offer of maybe $.50 per word might make you reluctant to turn you down, if they start showing signs of asking for any kind of personal information that they don’t need to, then you should turn them down immediately and cease all contact.

Next, some scams are a little harder to detect because they seem like they are real people trying to actually enlist your services. They might have a real document for you to translate, a backstory where they say they need it for a specific event, and even give you their full name, company name, and phone number. Up to this point, everything seems normal and there is no reason to have any suspicion. However, remember that scammers are always after ways to get money. So when the conversation changes to payment, this is where you should start to look extra carefully at what they are saying. There are scammers who will agree to your price and then send a check to your address for maybe double what they said. They will say that it is a “mistake” and ask that you transfer the money to their account because they need the money for some kind of personal, family emergency. This is where you should step back, tell them that you are no longer able to work with them, and then block their email address.

There are also resources that you can access if you feel that you need more education or assistance with dealing with scams. For this, ATA has a wealth of resources that you can utilize, such as an alert page: https://www.atanet.org/membership/internet_scams.php. They also help to keep everyone more aware of scam attempts through their articles in the The ATA Chronicle, which is published monthly.

Phishing: How to Avoid Being Reeled In
The ABCs of Cyber Security: Spam—It Isn’t Just for Breakfast Any More
A Little Paranoia Can Go a Long Way

You can also report fraudulent businesses and/or activity to www.fraud.org. That information will be transmitted to the appropriate law enforcement agencies.

There are a lot of ways for scammers to try and get you to give them what they want, but the important thing is always to just cease all communication as soon as possible. Scams are possible to be avoided, and through our collective cooperation, we will be able to give each other the tools and knowledge to prevent us from having to go through the horrible ordeal of being scammed. Hopefully this post helps you to avoid scams in the future.