A website that purports to help underprivileged children is actually a scam to dupe users into laundering money, a security company has warned.

A mass email detected by PandaLabs offers jobs at a supposed organisation committed to helping deprived children, but is actually a strategy to find unwary people to launder stolen money. 

The emails have subjects like 'Best Job No Experience Needed', while the message body offers a well-paid job working only a few hours a day for the bogus organisation.

The website linked in the email passes itself off as the site of charitable benefactors and uses images of children to try to win the confidence of potential 'mules' to convince them to take the job.

If a user contacts the fraudsters through the site they receive more details about the job. However, the operators also request money to be wired to a bank account.

The mule must send the money, minus a commission, to a certain address specified by the fraudsters.

"These fraudsters are not only looking for someone to launder the money, but for a scapegoat who the authorities will go after when the owner of the bank account they have cleaned out realises what has happened," said Luis Corrons, director of PandaLabs.

"In this case, the minimum that the bank can demand is that the runner pay back all the stolen money, that is apart from other legal action that can be taken which could even mean a prison sentence.

"If users have provided any data such as their name, bank account number etc, we advise them to immediately inform the authorities in order to avoid problems. "

Panda recommends all users to delete any messages of this type that reach their inboxes and not to provide any personal details that could be used for criminal activities.