Introduction
For 20 years, Indeed has been committed to the mission of helping all people get jobs. Central to that mission is the necessity to maintain a safe and professional platform for our users in what can be a vulnerable time in their lives- the job hunt. It is imperative that our users trust the integrity of the platform and the connections that they make. To build and maintain that trust, Indeed utilizes a number of internal tools, policies, and highly trained moderators and contractors that work tirelessly to identify and prevent fraud, as well as to ensure that content on our platform is inline with the quality standards set forth in Indeed’s Policy Center.
This Transparency Report is published in accordance with the transparency reporting requirements under Articles 15 and 24 of the European Union’s Digital Services Act (Regulation (EU) 2022/2065) (‘DSA’), for the reporting period of 16 February 2024 to 31 December 2024. At time of publication, Indeed has not been designated as a Very Large Online Platform (VLOP). For more information on Indeed’s commitment to transparency, please visit the Indeed Transparency Hub.
Description of Content Moderation Policies
As Indeed’s first layer of defense from potential threats, the Security team works closely with Indeed’s Product teams to protect job seekers and employers on our site in many ways, including by blocking bots and malicious requests and running a bug bounty program.
Blocking malicious traffic
Security uses a multi-layered system of defenses to detect and mitigate malicious traffic on Indeed, which primarily takes the form of bots, in addition to some human fraudsters.
Malicious bots are automated programs that can steal personal data, register fake accounts and otherwise abuse our platform. Indeed has implemented automated strategies that leverage network reputation, anomaly detection and other machine learning solutions to distinguish between human users and bots, blocking the latter before they infiltrate Indeed’s platform
Malicious requests are human-directed attacks on a network, through which bad actors attempt to compromise user accounts to perpetrate fraud. Though Indeed believes that most people on the Internet have good intentions, we strive to block those who don’t by using technology to determine the origin and intent of requests into our system.
Running a bug bounty program
Six years ago, as part of our long-standing commitment to security, Indeed established both public and private bug bounty programs, through which over 2,000 researchers flag potential gaps in our systems in exchange for compensation.
By crowdsourcing this information from third-party researchers, Indeed is able to focus its internal resources on resolving the identified vulnerabilities.
Trust & Safety at Indeed
As Indeed’s second line of defense, the Trust & Safety team strives to protect job seekers and employers from outstanding instances of fraud and quality violations by automatically and manually identifying and removing fraudulent accounts and identifying and removing low-quality job postings
What’s the difference between fraud and a quality violation?
Indeed defines fraud as accounts or job postings that target job seekers or employers with malicious actions or law-breaking activities. Indeed defines quality violations as accounts or job postings that may go against our Job Posting Guidelines.
Identifying and removing fraudulent accounts
Indeed uses automatic and manual means of identifying and removing fraudulent accounts from our site as quickly as possible. We have systems in place to automatically flag potentially risky accounts for review by our moderators, and our Trust & Safety team proactively uses various tools and subject matter expertise to manually identify any accounts that the automatic system may miss.
Users can also proactively identify and report potentially fraudulent accounts, which our moderators swiftly review and remove if they are found to be in violation of our policies. Users can also report all other user-generated content on the platform, including job posts, company page content, and messages. These reports are reviewed by trained moderators and actioned appropriately.
Through these automatic and manual means of identifying fraudulent accounts, Indeed is able to minimize their impact on our users, especially job seekers who do not then put themselves at risk by engaging with fraudulent employers.
Identifying and removing low-quality job postings
Indeed also works in the best interest of job seekers by striving to ensure that the jobs posted on our site are of the highest quality possible. In order to remain visible on the site, postings must offer open jobs (not training opportunities, expired positions, etc.), provide a detailed and accurate description of the role and be free of vulgar or illicit content, in addition to meeting other criteria outlined here.
As with fraudulent accounts, we have triggers in place that automatically flag postings that may not meet our standards for manual moderation. If a posting can be fixed, we will provide the employer with feedback and direct them to the Employer Help Center to help them do so. Additionally, users can flag any roles they deem problematic through the “report job” link at the bottom of any job posting. We use these reports to continuously improve our policy enforcement.
Indeed uses multiple methods for moderating user generated content. The main mechanisms for employer and jobseeker accounts can be used to either automatically action content, or enqueue the content for human moderation. Among the most notable methods are rules written using high risk indicators and signals and data science models that can predict the riskiness and health of an account.
Moderator training
Indeed’s moderation team is composed of 1000+ external vendor partners and a robust team of over 120 Trust & Safety professionals. Our moderators, located globally in 12 different countries, support clients and job seekers alike in 27 languages and 186 unique workflows within Indeed’s systems. These analysts and vendor partners undergo rigorous and specialized training, both prior to beginning work as well as continuous on-the-job training, in order to maintain the integrity of our systems and protect our users through each step of the hiring process.
Information about the content moderation Indeed did on its own initiative
| Policy or Terms of Service Violation | Number of violations | Instances of automatic removal | Instances of manual removal | Instances of action reversed |
| Child Sexual Abuse Material | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Commercial Communication | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Discrimination | 31,950 | 31,950 | 31,950 | 5,623 |
| Fraud | 268,336 | 100,040 | 183,730 | 18,391 |
| Harassment | 349 | 25 | 324 | 161 |
| Intellectual Property Infringement | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Trafficking | 57 | 0 | 57 | 4 |
| Job Seeker Guideline Violations | 20,259 | 4,644 | 15,525 | 161 |
| Job Post Quality Violation | 621,591 | 621,591 | 621,591 | 3,951 |
| Company Page Policy Violation | 144,332 | 46,385 | 97,947 | 1,672 |
Indeed’s Digital Services Act Reporting Portal and user reporting mechanisms
In addition to Indeed’s robust internal proactive methods for content moderation, users are able to report content that they may believe to be illegal or against Indeed’s policies. Each instance of user-generated content, such as a job advertisement or company review, contains an option for users to file a report for that specific piece of content. Through this feature, users are able to provide information on whether they believe the content is in violation of Indeed’s policies, or are redirected to our Digital Services Act Reporting Portal to make a report for content they believe may be illegal.
Notices submitted through the complaints handling portal, established in accordance with Article 16 of the DSA
All reports submitted through the Digital Services Act Reporting Portal undergo manual (human) review and moderation, as do any user appeals made as a result of Indeed’s decision and action on a user’s account or content. Indeed’s Trust & Safety team has a service level agreement (SLA) of 24 hours during the business week to review and moderate reports submitted through this portal; the median time of actual actioned reports is 8 business hours.
| Reason for complaint | Number of complaints | Instance of action taken as result of complaint | Instances decisions were reversed |
| Child Sexual Abuse Material | 41 | 1 | 0 |
| Commercial Communication | 267 | 30 | 0 |
| Discrimination | 311 | 86 | 0 |
| Fraud | 1149 | 363 | 0 |
| Harassment | 157 | 35 | 0 |
| Intellectual Property Infringement | 130 | 29 | 0 |
| Other | 783 | 38 | 0 |
| Trafficking | 111 | 3 | 0 |
Suspensions imposed for improper reporting
At the time of publication, Indeed has not identified any individuals or entities that frequently submit unfounded complaints through our reporting portal, and as such have no data to present as required under Article 23(2).
Reports from Trusted Flaggers
At the time of publication, Indeed has not received any reports from Trusted Flaggers as established pursuant to Section 22 of the Digital Services Act, and as such has no data to report.
Orders received under Articles 9 & 10
At the time of publication, Indeed has not received any orders for information from law enforcement pursuant to Sections 9 and 10 of the Digital Services Act, and as such has no data to report.
Number of disputes submitted to out-of-court body
Indeed recognizes that users may dispute our content moderation decisions, and have the rights to appeal both within our internal dispute resolution framework, as well as through out-of-court settlement bodies established by the European Union or through their country’s judicial system. Through our Statements of Reasons, Indeed informs users of this right. However, at the time of publication, Indeed has not received any notice of a dispute submitted to either an out-of-court settlement body.
Conclusion
Indeed is committed to providing its users a safe, professional, and trustworthy platform, and is constantly innovating and investing in new technologies and strategies to maintain the integrity of the platform by identifying and removing bad actors or illegal content. As these bad actors evolve, so do Indeed’s proactive moderation efforts, and should the content be missed by our moderators and controls, we work swiftly to remove the content from the platform to mitigate any risk to our users. Indeed remains committed to transparency to our users, and will continue to report as required under the specifications of the DSA and European Commission, as well as of our volition via our biannual corporate Transparency Reports, which can be found in our Transparency Hub.