TikTok has become onf the most popular social media platforms. It’s developed to such an extent that it’s now used for many different things, from shopping to learning about the latest news and events.
However, it’s also been used to exploit unwitting individuals in a range of different scams. It prompted us to undertake research into the problem, and below, you can find our results.
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How We Conducted Our Research
After noticing suspicious adverts on TikTok, the popular video-sharing platform, which offered unrealistic salaries and benefits to people seeking employment in the UK – we began to investigate.
Over the course of a month, we had a single TikTok user, a 25-year-old male based in the UK, archive the suspicious ads he came across while scrolling through his ‘For You Page’.
The adverts were archived by liking them so they would be stored in the user’s liked videos tab. The link to each of these videos was then uploaded to a spreadsheet.
After analysing the adverts, it became clear that there were two distinct categories, adverts being used to entice victims into Task Scams and averts engaging in Click Arbitrage.
What Are Task Scams?
Task scams promise money in exchange for completing simple tasks but trick victims into paying upfront fees to access their earnings. Eventually, the scammers take the money and cut contact.
Over the course of this investigation, we identified eight ads that we believe were being used to find victims for task scams. The ads generally impersonated legitimate recruitment companies and almost always asked applicants to apply via WhatsApp.
One of the recruitment companies which was being impersonated, Brook Street, confirmed to us that they were taking action to get one of the ads we highlighted taken down.
We also spoke to Ray Dowling, a 60-year-old based in Lincolnshire, who told us he was scammed out of £19,600 by a task scam which was being advertised on TikTok.
What Is Click Arbitrage?
Click Arbitrage, also called traffic arbitrage, is a process used by digital marketers and publishers to make a profit by directing traffic from one source on the internet to another.
A business buys traffic, in this case it pays for an ad on TikTok, it then redirects those users on TikTok to click a link which takes them to a landing page filled with other adverts.
The business makes a profit when the money it pays to run an ad on TikTok is less than what it makes from the traffic it has directed to other adverts.
Click arbitrage is legal so long as it complies with advertising regulations.
In total we found 281 adverts which engaged in click arbitrage over the course of this investigation, the majority of which targeted UK jobseekers.
Most of the fake job recruitment ads had their comments turned off, but the few that kept them on were filled with confused people trying to apply to non-existent roles. Some of the people even left their personal information, including phone numbers, in the comments.
One ad claimed that due to staff shortages, the NHS was offering free health care assistant courses that would provide certification, a free laptop, and job prospects.
Another featured a woman, suspected of being AI-generated, offering people in the UK a job in the care sector.
There were also 23 ads found offering low-cost dental services, one of which claimed to be offering Black Friday deals across its UK clinics.
We believe that the misleading nature of the adverts found during this investigation, meant that they were unlikely to fall within the Advertising Standards Authority’s Advertising Codes.
Other Ads We Found
Over the course of the investigation, we also found adverts for counterfeit money, cloned bank cards, and fake AirPods – 51 in total.
The adverts for counterfeit money and goods almost always directed users on TikTok over to Telegram where they could find more information on purchasing them.
Some of these adverts were removed before we reported to them to TikTok, the majority were removed afterward.
What Do Experts Say?
Jonathan Hardy, professor of Communications and Media at the University of the Arts London said: “This investigation shows that the existing Scam Ads Alert system set up by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) is not yet working effectively to prevent scam ads from harming job seekers and the wider public.”
Jelmer Zuidema, a recruitment marketing expert based in the Netherlands said: “This is a worldwide scam. We see ads from American, UK and European countries being used. The TikTok ads are also translated in multiple countries “
A spokesman for the online advertising fraud detection company Polygraph said: “It’s [click arbitrage] definitely not a victimless crime. We know of many companies—including those run by families—who are on the edge of shutting down due to the number of fraudulent clicks.”
What Does TikTok say?
A spokesperson for TikTok said: “Our Community Guidelines do not allow attempts to defraud or scam members of our community. This includes facilitating financial and individual-targeted scams, identity theft or phishing scams, and scams related to investments, financial transactions, or jobs.
“The content shared was a mixture of adverts and organic content, and we have removed any videos, adverts, and accounts that were found to violate our policies. To be clear, a number of adverts shared were no longer active on our platform.
“We have tens of thousands of trust and safety professionals dedicated to keeping TikTok safe. Users can also report suspicious activity in-app under “Frauds and Scams”.
“Between April and June 2024 we removed over 2.2 million ads for breaching our guidelines around fake, fraudulent or misleading ad content.”
