Ebay - Some Creep Trying To Rip Off Losing Bidders

Richard Blackmoore · Post by **Richard Blackmoore** » Thu Jun 29, 2006 9:22 pm

I lost out on an auction the other day fair and square. Today I got an E-Mail supposedly sent by an Ebay "lakebrink2006" member who turned out to be pretending to be the seller, telling me the winner withdrew/was rejected, so I was now the default winner. Worse, it had Ebay graphics all over it, he had the correct item number and description. So at first glance it looked legitimate, until I realized it was a different seller from a different state. Hmmmm.

Ebay's fraud investigation unit (contacted via online live chat) confirmed it was not a valid second chance offer, translation, a fraud and a scam to get my money.

Details posted including the scumbag's E-Mail to me at the link below, go to the end of the thread. This has nothing to do with Sir Gaston, this is some parasite that deserves to be beaten to death slowly. So if you lose an auction, be careful if you get a followup E-Mail saying you actually won and need to respond ASAP:

http://forums.armourarchive.org/phpBB2/ ... hp?t=61209

ARMOURER ERIC · Post by **ARMOURER ERIC** » Thu Jun 29, 2006 11:11 pm

I get 60-70 of theese a week, it is worse than you think. If you were to click on any link on the page it would have required a log in and promptly stole your log in info. Two warning signs off the bat A) the subject line is aw confirm ebay instead of just ebay 2)move your mose to any active link but do not click, my computer indicates the address that the link will take you to, and it is obvious that it is not ebay.

Eric

Duke Icefalcon · Post by **Duke Icefalcon** » Fri Jun 30, 2006 7:25 am

Now I am the type of guy who will screw you 10 times worse if I think you are messing with me. It is just in my nature and I realize it is a weakness on my part that needs to be corrected. Luckily for me, folks don't generally screw with me.

In the mean time- I know Richard and I get pissed when folks mess with my friends. If I had the technical knowhow (and I don't) I would find a way to make this person misereable through his computer.

If only I knew someone who was good at that sort of stuff......

Captain Jamie · Post by **Captain Jamie** » Fri Jun 30, 2006 8:19 am

Oh this sounds sooo close to "Who will rid me of this troublesome priest?"

Wish I could help.

Captain Jamie (techno serf)

Morgan · Post by **Morgan** » Fri Jun 30, 2006 8:36 am

Yeah, I had a "second chance" offer on a motorcycle. "I'm out of the country currently but the bike is ready to go, just send me a deposit to this address..."

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

schreiber · Post by **schreiber** » Fri Jun 30, 2006 9:07 am

Not to pee in everyone's wheaties, but there's no possibility of screwing with these people via computer.

Punishments for simple fraud can't hold a candle to the amount of hard time one could do as a result of what's being suggested. In addition, anyone capable of doing it is probably earning his living working with computers, and if caught, could kiss goodbye the possibility of ever getting a job again. You don't hire bank robbers to work a till.

You'd actually be better off finding the person and breaking his legs with a baseball bat.

FergusStout · Post by **FergusStout** » Fri Jun 30, 2006 9:19 am

schreiber wrote:Not to pee in everyone's wheaties, but there's no possibility of screwing with these people via computer.

Punishments for simple fraud can't hold a candle to the amount of hard time one could do as a result of what's being suggested. In addition, anyone capable of doing it is probably earning his living working with computers, and if caught, could kiss goodbye the possibility of ever getting a job again. You don't hire bank robbers to work a till.

You'd actually be better off finding the person and breaking his legs with a baseball bat.

Exactly. I am in the IT industry currently building web and application servers, but my background is in security. If the persons doing this are stupid enough to actually be traceable then they will be caught and dealt with by the authorities. While someone with my my background (white hat hacking) could certainly make their life interesting I would in no way do so as that would invalidate all of the trust in me required to do my job. The reality in the industry is that some of the most infamous hackers are the ones that are the most sought after in many situations because of their sheer talent. After having been 'rehabilitated' of course.

That said, I DO have a baseball bat :twisted:

Fergus

Richard Blackmoore · Post by **Richard Blackmoore** » Fri Jun 30, 2006 5:38 pm

Thank you everybody.

I really would like this would be thief to get in serious trouble. If anyone knows what legal authorities would look into something like this and the best way to reach them, let me know. I don't think Ebay is actually going to do much, I go the impression that they deal with this crap so much that they can't do much on their own. Which sucks. I tried getting somebody from Ebay on the phone since I could not get a definite answer in their tedious online chat (they kept not telling me directly that YES WE WILL DO SOMETHING, just that they would look into it).

I mean, this is criminal impersonation of a vendor in the attempt to defraud. People that do this via phone go to jail or get fined. Just because it is on the Internet, should not make it safe for these bastards.

Any ideas?

Oswyn_de_Wulferton · Post by **Oswyn_de_Wulferton** » Fri Jun 30, 2006 7:49 pm

Try hitting 0 when asked for the number option. It usually kicks you to a actual person, and gets you out of the number option.

Richard Blackmoore · Post by **Richard Blackmoore** » Fri Jun 30, 2006 8:25 pm

OswynHaddock wrote:Try hitting 0 when asked for the number option. It usually kicks you to a actual person, and gets you out of the number option.

I did, no luck. And if you manage to tell them you want a real person, it goes to a message directing you to the live chat option on the home page.

Sigh. I understand Ebay is wonderful. But in my limited experience so far, it seems hard to get direct answers from their help staff, I hate companies that don't let you talk to a real person on the phone when there is a potentially serious problem like criminal fraud. Finally, the fact that they did not aggressively want to go after this son of a bitch, makes me wonder how much they really want to protect both sellers and bidders.

Maybe I'm just having a bad week...

Alcyoneus · Post by **Alcyoneus** » Sat Jul 01, 2006 10:44 am

Considering the vast number of forgeries coming out of China sold on ebay, among other places, I think that the only thing they are interested is in selling listing spots.

Gwydion Caithnes · Post by **Gwydion Caithnes** » Sat Jul 01, 2006 1:35 pm

A couple of years ago, the opera company I ran held an online auction of art that was donated to us for the purpose as a fundraiser. We were working with a local company had their own proprietary bidding software, clientele, etc. We made over $10k on the auction, and everything went very well.

But a couple of months later, I got a call from someone who had just sent $4,000 overseas (to the Philippines, as I recall) via PayPal for an eBay auction to purchase a work of art. He sent me the links. Sure enough, the item photos and description was lifted verbatum from our vendor's site, including the fact that the auction was to benefit my opera company (which is how he knew to call me).

I had to tell the poor schmuck to kiss his $4,000 goodbye, and file complaints with PayPal, eBay, and the FBI - all of which would (in all liklihood) accomplish nothing towards getting his money back.

Of course, the eBay "seller" had NO feedback, and had been an eBay member for exactly two days. I couldn't believe the buyer had actually sent that much money away without checking into things further...

I almost got taken in earlier this week by a message from an "eBay buyer" who said they had sent me money and were waiting for shipping. Never mind that I didn't happen to be selling anything on eBay at the time... When I clicked on the link to "respond" to the message, it took me to an "eBay page" asking for my eBay screen name and (of course) password to "log in." Fortunately, I looked at the url appearing on my browser, and noted that it wasn't an eBay site...

You gotta be careful out there in the cybermarket, folks!

brunoG · Post by **brunoG** » Sat Jul 01, 2006 2:31 pm

Simple security test

1) copy and paste the link that comes with the suspicious email into a fresh browser window, than read it: almost surely it will be a numeric address IP followed by some strange stuff.

So if it looks like this http://102.44.99.31 or, let's say http://204.33.9918/cgi/ebayvalidation.other stuff , it is a 100% scam.

Cancel the textual part from the address and just press enter leaving in the address bar just the numbers like this

http://204.33.99.18

you will be able to see the webpage of a webhosting company watsoever, not an ebay's one.

2) you are lazy, just follow the link provided and enter a deficient user id and password couple, not yours, such as : Mickey Mouse, or let's say 20 casual characters per field.

You will be granted with an "ebay's " thank you page.

So the freeaks will collect pure ********.

juan · Post by **juan** » Sat Jul 01, 2006 5:00 pm

Even simpler:

If you get a message from a company that you do business with or through --whether it's eBay, Paypal, your ISP, online banking, whatever-- NEVER click the links on the email.

Instead, go to the webpage in your browser and log in normally. That way you know that you're dealing with the correct entity, and if nothing new comes up there, you know the email was fake.

- juan

Bjorn-n-Thorhild · Post by **Bjorn-n-Thorhild** » Sat Jul 01, 2006 11:20 pm

juan wrote:Even simpler:

If you get a message from a company that you do business with or through --whether it's eBay, Paypal, your ISP, online banking, whatever-- NEVER click the links on the email.

Instead, go to the webpage in your browser and log in normally. That way you know that you're dealing with the correct entity, and if nothing new comes up there, you know the email was fake.

- juan

Better yet, go into your Ebay account and check your messages from there. If it doesn't show up there, it's definitely not kosher. Had a clever bastard try that with us last week. Used an actual item we had up for sale in a message to us. There was just something that didn't seem right, so I checked and sure enough, it wasn't in my Ebay message folder.

Thorhild

Ron Broberg · Post by **Ron Broberg** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 12:12 pm

To illustrate this technique,
the following link does not take you to eBay.
www.ebay.com

This isn't just one guy.
There are hundreds or thousands who are doing this.

knoch · Post by **knoch** » Mon Jul 03, 2006 12:14 pm

If this one aint a scam I not sure what is then

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/IRAQI-IN ... dZViewItem

from Knoch

Ledermann · Post by **Ledermann** » Mon Jul 03, 2006 2:52 pm

knoch wrote:If this one aint a scam I not sure what is then

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/IRAQI-IN ... dZViewItem

from Knoch

Well THAT'S just dumb... simple words and enough said.

Duke Icefalcon · Post by **Duke Icefalcon** » Mon Jul 03, 2006 5:26 pm

So far I like the bat idea.....

Leo Medii · Post by **Leo Medii** » Mon Jul 03, 2006 9:55 pm

If you get a message from a company that you do business with or through --whether it's eBay, Paypal, your ISP, online banking, whatever-- NEVER click the links on the email.

Instead, go to the webpage in your browser and log in normally. That way you know that you're dealing with the correct entity, and if nothing new comes up there, you know the email was fake.

Gospel.

On the net. Trust. No. One.