I did a search for this particular issue but haven’t found anything, so I figured I’d ask here.
I’m a recently laid off, early career project manager. I applied for a remote project management job. The posting seemed legit. A few days after applying, I got an email with a Google form asking me some screening questions about leading teams, conflict resolution, retrospectives, stuff like that (boilerplate questions for PM interviews).
I answered the questions, but the very last page of the Google form is instructions on how to download a corporate VPN. The reasoning: “This will provide you access to our internal documentation, allowing you to familiarize yourself with the specific aspects of the role. Once you have reviewed the materials, we will schedule a call to discuss any questions you have and to further explore your fit for the position.”
In the 250+ jobs I’ve applied for since being laid off in July, I have never seen this. I’ve seen one other Google form but it didn’t have this VPN stuff. Is this normal, or a scam? I’m very wary and advice would be appreciated before I even submit this form!
Yeah that’s sketch. I can’t think of any good reason they can’t send you the same documents via sharepoint/dropbox without a VPN.
Anything so sensitive (internal finance documents, HIPAA protected info, customer data, etc) that it needs an encrypted connection should not be shared with candidates.
Makes me wonder if this “VPN” is really a “totally_not_trojan_virus.exe”.
Curious to know if you moved forward with the VPN? Reason I ask is the exact same thing just happened to me. Google form as well and last page asked me to download VPN with the exact same verbiage. The company seemed legit as well
Interesting - I just got the request to complete the goole form from Steven Hatch HR Manager at. Emco Partners. The email came in around 1 am. (First red flag). Second red flag: I looked at the website - seems very basic and didn’t reveal much about the company. Another red flag: there is no profile for the above person on Linkedin and there seems to be a few companies with this name?! The job ad has also been taken down… Don’t think I’ll be downloading the VPN.
The only person I know who needed a vpn to work from home was someone employed by the government who dealt in super sensitive stuff. This sounds weird af.
Very strange. But I would be curious to see what they want you to download. If it’s from a legitimate website, I would connect, ideally from a sandbox VM. I understand you might not be having one easy to fire up. Not sure I would just connect to a sketchy VPN with my main terminal…
having to use a VPN to access intranet sites is a common occurrence in a lot of older companies that haven’t jumped ship to fully cloud based software.
most likely the instructions are about downloading OpenVPN or one of the myrial compatible clones of it. OP, worst case scenario is call them up and ask if they can provide you with instructions for OpenVPN. that’s all.
I know what a VPN is good for. I use one every day.
Would, no could you provision a candidate and make them install a company VPN to access internal files before an interview? Your IT should never allow that.
well if you want to know how they work with your internal docs then yes, you would???
i applied to a programming job recently and they gave me access to their private git repos during recruitment. an older company that doesn’t have that on the cloud might have given me access to an intranet git repository instead via VPN.
reliable “cloud intranet” solutions are much younger than github, so it’s entirely possible to imagine. wtf?