upvote
What's the path for that to even happen?

Are companies now commonly uploading lists of employees to LinkedIn? Is this happening automatically because you got an e-mail account from the company and the company runs on MS Office and you're identified as am employee within it? What triggered it?

This seems like somewhat of a scandal that deserves its own post, but it also needs a lot more details to be trustworthy and for people to understand what exactly is happening.

Also, was there some way for you to take ownership of the profile? Did it depend on verifying a certain e-mail address? Does it require you to get the company to remove it, or could you take ownership and then delete the LinkedIn account/profile yourself?

reply
I rather suspect the information was siphoned to linkedin from the payroll company the consulting firm was using. While there are a zillion small consulting firms, there are a small number of firms which process their payroll (whether to employees or independent contractors like myself). I have no evidence to back this up but after thinking it through, it made more sense than every little mom/pop/medium size niche company all cooperating with linkedin vs a hand full of mega payroll consolidators selling aggregated lists to linkedin. Again, speculation on my part.
reply
Interesting. That's a possibility... but how much information did the LinkedIn account have? Did it have your full job title? I'm not sure how much information is shared with payroll providers.

Again, there's no real reporting on the internet of LinkedIn creating profiles for people without their consent. If you have any documentation and details, this is the kind of thing worth posting here in full detail and/or contacting a journalist about. Of course, if it was in the past you might not have any of that info anymore.

reply
We used to have to destroy org charts and handbooks so that our companies wouldn't get hacked, not they just throw that out the windows and act shocked when something happens.
reply
I’ve seen fake accounts created by bad actors attempting to pose as others for gaining remote employment. It’s possible that is what was happening, and the takedown was from LI taking down the profile from the bad actor.

Other times they would just link to real LinkedIn profiles, but the LinkedIn profile will say that they’re not actively looking and are a victim of id fraud basically.

It’s been a huge issue spotting candidates falsifying information since remote work took off unfortunately. They payout is if they can get at least 1 or 2 paychecks before being found out, they’ve made a good profit.

reply
Of all the reading I've done on this story, your comment so far is the only post which would explain why linkedin is even doing this.

If anyone else as any more info on the why, please share.

reply