It's called the fake check scam and it has seen an increase in cases in Georgia.

This time the scheme is targeting people who are looking for work and college-age people who are just hitting the job market.

It works like this: Potential victims are being contacted by what appears to be a reputable firm advising you that you have been "hired."

The scam involves them wanting to send a check and have you deposit the funds and send a portion back to them. Of course the check is not real, but the money that's sent back to them is.

One target of the scam was Dave Mueller, of Savannah, who tells WSB, he became a focus when he visited a legitimate website, the Kroger site.

"I got this text from Kroger asking about me being a 'mystery shopper,'" Mueller says. "Typically I'm familiar with those scams, but it was coming from Kroger, so I confirmed it and they sent me a link. I thought that this looks legitimate, so I gave them my address."

Mueller says he received a mailing a few days later and knew, immediately, that he was being scammed.

"As soon as I read the first paragraph I said to myself, 'Man, this is a scam,'" he says, "because they said they were going to send me a check."

The check, a copy of which can be seen here, looks real, but it is not.

Mueller, who is retired and whose father was a St. Louis cop for 36 years, did not send any money to the con artists and went about trying to find out who was behind the scheme.

What he found was that the bank that the check was drawn upon is legitimate, that the addresses listed for the "agents" who were to receive the money are either vacant homes or houses for sale, and that a majority of those listed are from the metro Atlanta area.