[Spridgets] E-bay Scam

[Robert Duquette]

These do come from an ebay account though.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,391774,00.html


>From: shelden3 at pldi.net

>When I address groups about the scams of the Internet the first thing I
>tell them is to not click on links that want your money, could want your
>money etc...  Emails can be made to look very convincing.  Best practice
>is to ALWAYS go to the merchants home page by manually entering it into
>your browser.  Do NOT click on the merchants banner or link with in the
>email as it will take you to their site which is designed to look like
>your bank, eBay etc.....  By doing this you can verify the transaction and
>or communication.
>
>These scams work as you can see which is why they get sent out.
>
>  I nearly got scammed out of $2000 this week in a e-bay transaction that I
> > didn't figure out until the scammer asked for a MoneyGram.  E-bay 
>reported
> > this morning that the scam came from an "unauthorized account take-over" 
>=
> > hack.  This is doubly dangerous, as the initial correspondence was
> > "official", including my e-bay ID and all graphics and formatting (with
> > instructions not to send a MoneyGram).
> >
> > The auction closed without meeting the seller's reserve.  I then got a
> > Second Chance notice saying the seller had reduced his Buy-it-now price 
>to
> > $2000 - a bargain "too good to be true".  This notice included my e-bay 
>ID
> > and in all respects looked official - same pictures, same text, logo,
> > everything.  Somewhere around then I also got another copy in which my
> > e-bay ID was replaced with "buyer".  I might have noticed the logo at 
>that
> > time, as Vista usually blocks them.  But I did not, so I accepted.  Then 
>I
> > got a direct message from the scammer, bypassing e-bay.  We had several
> > back and forths, before he asked for a MoneyGram.
> >
> > I had one real response from the seller that included his name.  So I
> > found him on WhitePages.com and called.  He had been getting all manner 
>of
> > messages about cars that were not his, and two hours before had 
>contacted
> > e-bay, erased his account, and established a new ID.
> >
> > So, the lesson is that you may not be able to recognize a scam until 
>they
> > ask for a direct payment of some kind outside of e-bay and PayPal.