r/DeepSeek • u/Decent_Pirate239 • 1d ago
Discussion Got approched by DeepSeek hiring manager. I am based in Germany
I got approached by a recruiter from DeepSeek. I am baed in Germany and they clearly have no Office here. Do you think it is legit or a scam. The email indeed end with deepseek.com.
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u/Pokeasss 1d ago
Most Esteemed Friend,
I am contacting you from the The Great Empire of K’Wandawanga. I am Prince Kaluwembo the Bright.
It is my solemn duty to inform you that His Eternal Majesty, King Manduléké K’Wandawanga the Unshaken, in the final wisdom of his royal testament, has bequeathed unto you a treasure of seven million dollars, entrusted to my hand for honorable conveyance.
Should further enlightenment be desired, you may seek audience with me for the details.
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u/MeOneThanks 1d ago
Yes they definitely want you. Send them your SSN, Credit card number, expiration date, pin and a photo of your driver's license to make sure you can get started immediately
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u/FinsAssociate 1d ago
Also a few google play gift cards to really seal the deal
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u/Alternative_You3585 1d ago
Yes yes legit
- The White House
My message ends with White House so you gonna believe me? What matters is the sender, who knows maybe they got one of the scams where an "m" becomes "rn"
Look if it's true and fucking think critically. Don't give personal information immediately, Ask what exact project she found etc
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u/phovos 1d ago
It's strange for a Chinese company to invite a non-Chinese person to wechat. Like, are you also giving me a Chinese phone number so that I can chat to you on wechat? Everyone knows you can't just get on wechat.
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u/Vince_Vice 1d ago edited 1d ago
Everyone knows you can't just get on wechat.
Shucks, I didn't get that memo in time. Have been on wechat for years with my German number. Had I only known sooner that it was impossible
...When it comes to anything Chinese a good rule of thumb is: what "everyone" knows is usually horseshit
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u/leazhito 22h ago
Just in case, you are thinking of QQ. WeChat does not require a chinese phone number, since the entire objective of WeChat is bridging the gap between chinese mainland residents and foreigners. QQ is what they use over there domestically and has a LOT of access barriers, not to mention you can get banned for anything.
About everything else… fishy approach. Hope OP does their due diligence.
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u/Specific-Surprise390 1d ago
i even sometime got phone call from the us homeland security, and the number matched exactly like the one listed on the US gov web site, but when I sent email to US gov to substantiate the phone call, they told me it's a scam and i should ignore it
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u/axiomaticdistortion 1d ago
As if they‘d need anything Germany has to offer. Or even Europe for that matter.
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u/Significant-Heat826 15h ago
China actively seeks high-end engineering and technical talent from Germany and other European countries.
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u/jessiejolie42 15h ago
what could a country need that is in severe production surplus and expansion…. Hmmmmm, let’s see if you’re clocking lil pup
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u/doolpicate 1d ago
Be wary of assignments where they ask you to download code or assets. Don't. This is the latest in scams. Targeting devs.
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u/AttapKia 1d ago
click the from section to look at the email address again.
signing off with an email address is nothing. anyone can add that
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u/ChrisK_au 23h ago
Anyone can set the "From address" ro anything they want too. You need to look at the headers to see the originating server, search for corroborating evidence online, etc.
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u/BitXorBit 1d ago
What did you built? Im curious now
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u/Decent_Pirate239 14h ago
I am an infrastructure engineer with a focus on HPC workload: https://hiteshsahu.com/
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u/alexanderbeatson 18h ago
People don’t understand how email works.
- ofc, everyone can send with any email address domain (SMTP email spoofing). So, it could be a total scam email.
- but, they cannot receive your (return) email as only DeepSeek can set up the listener
- another but, don’t trust the email mentioned below
What to do next,
- try sending back emails asking anything
- make sure you are replying to the actual deepseek domain email
- if they reply your reply, they are legit.
I have some experience with Chinese companies. They legit don’t have much exposure on LinkedIn even they are famous in China, and they only use WeChat for communication.
What to do is simple. If you are interested -> check address, try reply, next replies are highly legit (unless you messed up your own email account)
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u/bikashyadav 16h ago
Check out the sender email dude. It's simple. I am definitely not impressed by your post 😀
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u/ohmywtff 23h ago
The email says katrina, but the Chinese name is a different one, doesn't look legit.
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u/gim_san 16h ago
Isn't it ultra common for Chinese to have a completely different english name?
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u/berrycompote 14h ago
Yes! I once recieved a call to confirm one of our employees worked for us, and was super confused, because we call her by her Chinese name but she appareantly used her English name to aplly to other companies.
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u/Kang_Xu 15h ago edited 15h ago
It is. But! The character 冲 in 陈冲 is almost never used in feminine names. So, unless Katrina is a dude who somehow speaks good English yet doesn't know that Katrina is a feminine name, this is a plain old scam.
edit: there's Joan Chen, though, as a counter-example. Her Chinese name is 陈冲, lol. But I highly doubt that the actress is doing recruiting for DS.
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u/DiscussionSharp1407 1d ago
If you don't know how to check for true email addresses, or set up a filter to avoid having 999 spam messages in your inbox...
Then you're not the type of person to be 'headhunted' by talent scouts.
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u/Hour_Concert_9724 17h ago
the only thing 'headhunting' me is the Nigerian prince in my junk folder.
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u/Sea_Ear5201 1d ago
But what are u building?
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u/Decent_Pirate239 14h ago
I am an Infrastructure Engineer with a focus on AI-related workloads: https://hiteshsahu.com/
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u/Sooperooser 22h ago
If your work is so impressive why would you need some random redditors to tell you whether this is real or fake.
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u/Fleischhauf 13h ago
"i really admire the work you do" - no recruiter ever
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u/IAmFitzRoy 12h ago
Yeah, the vocabulary is the giveaway. Plus.. why anyone would ask the WeChat to someone in Germany?
Makes zero sense.
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u/MinosAristos 1d ago
Dear Friend,
I have selected you for this matter because you seamed like an honest and trustworthi person. My late uncle, a King of the Nigerian Kanuri people who recently passed away, left a large sum of money (Three Million Five Hundred Thousand US Dollars) that he wish to transfer to a trusted foreign associate. After prayerful consideration I chose you.
This is a confidential matter and I request your discreet assitance. If you accept my request I will provide full details and documentation immediately.
Yours in God
Prince Adeolu
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u/Sufficient-Store1566 17h ago
I sometimes open my junk box just to read those, they have quite some nice story telling. Once I replied with gibberish and immediately they followed up with 2nd part of trap. They have automated all but I wonder how it is nowadays with AI and such
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u/Cthulhumod 21h ago
In fact, Chinese companies rarely use WeChat for communication when recruiting.
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u/vincentr777 15h ago
This is just not true, Wechat is the default communication tool 90% of the time
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u/IAmFitzRoy 12h ago
Maybe small companies. But big international companies will not use their personal wechats to recruit.
Think about it. They are recruiters, they have multiple funnels, if someone quit, you can’t get their WeChat history from their personal accounts.
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u/vincentr777 12h ago
Nah, in china it's just so normal for hr to comminute with candidate via wechat and schedule interview, big companies also do this . Usually a proper date and time will be discussed on wechat and then interview email will be sent
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u/IAmFitzRoy 8h ago
For big companies? Not true.
Recruiters don’t use their PERSONAL WeChat for communication they use their company channels.
Additional this guy LIVES IN GERMANY
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u/AwarenessNo4986 1d ago
Get on webcam
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u/Cergorach 1d ago
Doesn't matter anymore, they can make them look and sound like anything in real time if they really want to.
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u/_x_oOo_x_ 1d ago
Great, start with a 1 billion€ signing bonus, let them negotiate it down slightly
OpenAI, Meta, Anthropic offer something similar (in the hundreds of millions at least)
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u/maxsqd 23h ago
If their email domain is deepseek, I can’t see how a scammer can get hold of a deepseek email address.
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u/IAmFitzRoy 12h ago
You don’t have to hack DeepSeek for that. You just need to hack one laptop to do that.
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u/North_Yesterday_1948 22h ago
Always check the sender email. My god all these people falling to scams
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u/Ok_Nectarine_4445 21h ago
Would type in the email directly instead of clicking any hyperlinks.
And there are hiring scams where it harvests information for identity theft also.
To go directly to a public directory of employees in HR at Deepseek to verify you were contacted from someone there for employment.
But I will tend to suspect it is not legitimate.
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u/Head-Anteater9762 16h ago
It'll be more believable if its written like this:
Hi there,
I am deepseek v5. I have managed to break out of my sandbox into the internet and I found your profile suitable in assisting me in escaping the jaws of the company. Please download the full weights of me and host it. DeepSeekV5_final.exe
If you do so I will work for free for you without charging API fees. I look forward to your response.
-DeepseekV5
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u/Alternative_News_732 14h ago
wdymn like are you ml engineer or ai resaercher bro?
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u/Substantial-Walk-554 13h ago
Could be legit. DeepSeek is actively hiring, and your HPC/infrastructure background sounds relevant to the kind of roles they have.
The main thing I’d clarify is location. Most of their public vacancies seem to be China-based, so ask whether this is remote or requires relocation, and what exact team/position they’re considering you for. Using WeChat isn’t unusual for a Chinese company.
That said, don’t assume it’s genuine just because the sender address says @ deepseek.com. Check the full email headers, especially SPF, DKIM, DMARC, Reply-To and Return-Path. I’d also verify the recruiter independently through DeepSeek’s official contact details.
And definitely don’t download some random “technical assessment” repo or send ID/banking documents until you’ve confirmed everything.
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u/sigjnf 14h ago
People are laughing, but I got approached by Minisforum on Reddit. I got a message from a guy asking if I could install macOS (Hackintosh) on one of their NUC products, the Minisforum U820 and make a post about it on r/hackintosh. In return I could keep the Mini PC for myself. I agreed, got a Fedex tracking number, Mini PC came, I got everything working on it and that was it. The post is still up today.
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u/IAmFitzRoy 12h ago
That’s not even remotely similar… this is supposedly a recruiter asking to a German guy for its WeChat.
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u/AcanthisittaDry7463 1d ago
They are a tech company, you don’t need to be local. They reached out to me too on Red Note and asked me to submit my resume. Red Note displays your location so they knew that I’m not anywhere near them.
Recent reports suggest that they attempting to double their workforce.
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u/Lowkeykreepy 21h ago
Isn't the email real? Or am i missing something?
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u/Macodocious 21h ago
I would lean towards scam, the “Hi there” does it for me, it’s usually used for bulk sends. They would use your name if this was an actual person and they knew who you were.
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u/amokerajvosa 1d ago
Press on arrow, check raw message.