Number one: you have to provide your bank account numbers or other personal information. If an employer wants you to work from home, they may very well ask you for your social security number for income tax purposes. This is not too unusual. However, they will never ask you for personal information such as bank account numbers, your mother's maiden name, how long you've owned your home, etc. as a condition for employment. You'll know it's a home business scam when they seem more interested in getting information FROM you rather than giving tasks TO you.

Number two: your job requires you to get new workers to do the work for you. This is a variation on the typical pyramid scheme home business scam and should sound a few warning bells right off the bat. If your job is based on finding other people to work for you, it's probably a multi-level marketing system that you don't want any part of. Pyramid schemes like this work by having one person find other workers to sell, market or distribute materials. It benefits the upper-tier workers who have a lot of people under them. Keep in mind, though, that if you've just signed on to a pyramid-scheme type business, you're automatically at the bottom. The real benefits to you will be negligible, while all of your work goes to make a few people at the top rich.

If you have ever watched popular news magazine programs, you may have heard of the Nigerian email scams. These are growing in number because these scammers are hard to trace. If you ever are asked to deposit money for someone you need to contact the appropriate authorities. Know that if someone asks you to loan them 500 dollars so they can pay you back 1,000 or more, you are being scammed.

The bottom line is, if a work-from-home opportunity sounds too good to be true, it probably is a home business scam that you don't want to be a part of at all. If they've contacted you, wanting you (out of all the millions of workers, they chose you!!) to work for THEM, it's a scam. If you have to give them money to work for them, it's a scam. In short, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. You'll either be taken advantage of, exploited, or bankrupted if you're not careful.

Donat get discouraged. There are legitimate home based businesses out there. You just have to find them. They will not come to you in your inbox. Some of the most popular opportunities are website design and affiliate marketing. It is advised that you thoroughly research any program before you join though.

The Better Business Bureau can help you get an idea of the companyas history. Check with them before joining. Searching online can also provide information on the company. If they are known to scam people, you will find this out on message boards, forums and chat rooms. If someone has been burned, they are going to talk about it online.

As tempting as the promise of great wealth is, be cautious of the companies you conduct business with. If you are ever asked to practice unethical tasks like searching out personal information or an email address on an individual, you know that you are involved in a scam. If they will do this to others, it will happen to you.