Trust and safety
Modeling scams and how Maxgirls screens them out
Four scams take more money from freelance models than everything else combined. Here is how each one works, what a reviewed directory can genuinely prevent, and what it cannot. We would rather tell you the limits than pretend the review step makes strangers safe.
What they look like from the inside
The paid portfolio
How it runs
Someone "scouts" you, is enthusiastic, and explains that the next step is a portfolio shoot with their photographer, at your cost, typically several hundred dollars. Sometimes there is a "registration fee" or a "website fee" instead.
The tell
Nobody who books models charges the model to be booked. Money flows towards the talent. Any request for payment to be represented, listed, scouted or photographed is the scam, even when the images you get are technically fine.
What Maxgirls does
Maxgirls charges a subscription for a listing and says so on the pricing page. We never sell you a shoot, a course or a scouting upgrade, and no Maxgirls staff will ever contact you offering one.
The overpayment cheque
How it runs
A booking arrives by email, generously paid, and the "client" sends more than agreed by cheque or transfer, then asks you to forward the difference to a stylist or a travel agent. The original payment reverses days later.
The tell
The tell is always the same: money arriving before any work, and an urgent request to pass part of it on to a third party.
What Maxgirls does
Human review keeps obvious fake profiles out of the directory, but it cannot vet a stranger who emails you. Never forward funds. Wait for a payment to clear with your own bank, not with the sender's receipt.
The fake casting
How it runs
A "casting" that is really a private meeting: no crew, no call sheet, a hotel room or an apartment, and pressure to shoot content that was never in the brief. Sometimes the brand name is real and stolen.
The tell
A real booking has a call sheet, a contactable production company, a stated usage and a release you can read in advance. Ask for those three things every time and the fake ones evaporate.
What Maxgirls does
We publish what a legitimate brief contains so you can compare. We cannot vouch for anyone who contacts you, and we will never tell you a stranger is verified when they are not.
The stolen identity listing
How it runs
Somebody builds a profile out of your photographs, or out of a stranger's, and uses it to solicit money or content from brands and from other models.
The tell
This is the one a directory is genuinely good at stopping, because publication is not automatic.
What Maxgirls does
Every profile is read by a person before it goes public, mismatched sets are rejected, and rejections carry a reason. If you find your images on a Maxgirls profile that is not yours, email us and we will take it down.
Our side of it
What we check, and what we cannot
A directory that oversells its own safety is more dangerous than one that is honest about the edges, because people relax. So this list has two halves.
We do
- Read every profile before it is published, photos and bio included.
- Reject with a written reason, so a mistake can be fixed and resubmitted.
- Strip location EXIF from every uploaded file automatically.
- Store originals on a private disk and stream them through one controller.
- Blur 18+ photos at file level, so nothing explicit reaches an unconfirmed viewer.
- Remove contact details from bios so approaches stay on record.
- Take down a profile using someone else's photographs as soon as we are told.
We do not
- Vet the brands and photographers who email you. Anyone can send an email.
- Check identity documents. Review reads the photos, the bio and the categories, and a profile using someone else's photographs comes down as soon as we are told.
- Escrow, invoice or guarantee payment for any booking.
- Sit in the conversation between you and a client, or see what you were paid.
Before you accept a booking
Ask for the production company and check it exists independently of the email you were sent. Ask for the call sheet with the location, the crew and the hours. Ask what the usage licence covers and for how long, and read the release before the day. What a release actually covers and how to quote a day rate both go into this in detail. Tell someone where you are going.
Reporting something
Email support@maxgirls.com with the profile URL and what is wrong. Stolen photographs, an impersonated identity and unmarked 18+ material are all removed on sight while we work out what happened, rather than after an investigation.
Get started
A reviewed listing, on terms you can read
Create your profile, and a person will review it before it goes live.