Publishing Fraud
We regret that fraudulent emails are widespread. Scammers target authors in a number of ways, from offering publishing deals, film or TV contracts, marketing and promotion or other literary services. Sometimes these are general, but we have also seen approaches in which the sender impersonates a real employee of Profile Books.
We would like to emphasise that these emails are fraudulent and have no connection whatsoever to Profile Books or to individual employees.
Please be aware of the following:
- We do not use Gmail, Hotmail, or any other free email service for professional communications. Genuine correspondence is sent exclusively from addresses ending in @profilebooks.com.
- Senders’ addresses may contain misspellings, substitutions (e.g. 1 for l) or variations of our profilebooks.com domain.
- If you are ever in any doubt about whether a communication claiming to be from Profile Books is genuine, please contact us directly at [email protected] and we will verify it for you.
- Profile Books never requests payment for manuscript submissions or book promotion.
- We do not partner with third parties who provide paid for services (except within the normal processes of publication, such as known freelancers including copyeditors, and we will always introduce you to those people before you begin working with them).
If you receive one of these emails, do not follow any links, do not open attachments and do not reply.
If you do respond in error, we would urge you not to share any personal or financial information with the sender, and not to make any payments. If you believe you may have been defrauded, please report the matter to Action Fraud, the UK’s national fraud reporting centre, at www.actionfraud.police.uk or by calling 0300 123 2040.
When we become aware of fraudulent activity, we always take steps to have the fraudulent account reported and removed.
Here are some more resources you may find helpful:
https://societyofauthors.org/resource/how-to-protect-against-scammers-a-guide-for-authors/