Writing a resumé isn’t especially complicated, but writing one that attracts the attention of recruiters is far more difficult. To maximise their chances of success, some jobseekers are now trying their hand at “white fonting”.

The idea is simple: jobseekers copy paragraphs from the job advertisement they’re interested in and paste them in white into their resumé, making them invisible to the human eye. They must also ensure the text they hide is as small as possible so as to take up as little room as possible without compromising the rest of the document.

The aim of this technique is to fool the Applicant Tracking System (ATS) used by many recruiters to sort through applications they receive for a position as a first step in the recruitment process.

ATS software is based on algorithms that scan resumés for information that suggests whether an applicant is qualified or not for a position. They comb through the titles of previous jobs held by the applicant, or their skills and qualifications.

The software doesn’t read a resumé in the same way as a recruiter; it looks for a match between keywords in a job description and those in an application. These programs, therefore, have no qualms about eliminating an applicant who doesn’t tick all the employer’s predefined boxes, even if the applicant is qualified for the role.

Aware of the importance ATS places on keywords, some applicants don’t hesitate to fill their resumés with technical terms that are relevant to the position they’re applying for, even if they have no connection with their professional background.

And the most bold even go as far as using “white fonting” to do this.

But recruitment specialists warn against this trick. “Even if a candidate slips past the ATS filters, ultimately their resumé is going to land in the hands of a real hiring manager.

“If that person sees discrepancies between the words on the page and the so-called skills in their ATS profile, they’re going to notice,” explains Natalie Boren, senior vice-president of recruitment firm Career Group Companies, speaking to Business Insider.

To avoid falling into such traps, the best thing to do is to adapt your resumé to each job offer you apply for. This can be extremely time consuming but it’s worth it if you’re applying for your dream job.

In any case, don’t waste too much time polishing your resumé: it’s better to have a readable document that includes all the essential information (job titles, skills, education, etc.), than a highly polished one that will take a recruiter longer to decipher.

Remember that on average, a hiring manager spends between 30 seconds and two minutes reading a resumé.