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The Documentary: Jobfished

Jobfished

22/02/2022 GMT

BBC World Service - The Documentary, Jobfished

How people were hired to work for a successful design agency but the whole thing was fake

How people from all over the world were hired to work for a seemingly glamorous and successful design agency - but the whole thing was fake.

It is 2020. Covid Britain is in lockdown and the world is working from home. In the depths of the deadly pandemic and when people were at their lowest - someone spots an opportunity. This is the story of how people from all over the world were hired to work for a seemingly glamorous and successful design agency…but the whole thing was fake.

The company was built on fakery and its office was not real. But its own staff had no idea. For months they slogged as unwitting victims of an elaborate online con, tricked into believing they had good jobs at a successful company. They had been jobfished.

If the whole thing was a game it wasn’t a funny one. Workers got into debt waiting for paychecks that never arrived. They lied to thousands of people trying to get new business for the company. Others were promised life-changing visas to the UK. But all of it was a lie, and it was only uncovered after curious staff did some digging. Who was behind the con? And what on earth were they trying to achieve?

Investigative journalist Catrin Nye and her team expose a tangled web of lies, confronting the boss to get to the truth of what really happened.

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