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Police warn of rising Ebay fraud
CBC News (Canada) ^ | 9-13-03 | CBC Online staff

Posted on 09/14/2003 12:13:45 AM PDT by PatrioticCowboy

Police warn of rising Ebay fraud

Last Updated Sat, 13 Sep 2003 11:23:21

EDMONTON - Police in Alberta are joining forces with their colleagues in the U.S. to fight crime that knows no borders: Internet and telephone fraud.

Alberta will be joining B.C., Ontario and Quebec, which already have agreements with U.S. authorities to share information.

The main focus will be call-centre fraud in Canada targeting Americans, but police are hoping the co-operation will allow joint investigations in Internet crime.

One area of Internet crime that is growing is fraud involving the online auction site Ebay.

Users of the site sometimes post an item for auction, receive payment, but never send the goods.

Ebay customers also sometimes receive e-mail messages that appear to be from Ebay, but are actually from someone trying to rip them off.

They're called "spoof" e-mails. They look authentic, carrying the Ebay logo and an Ebay return address.

They threaten to cancel customers' accounts if they don't reply with their account information.

If a costumer does, the person who sent the e-mail can use the account to place bids and charge the customer's credit card.

Representatives from Ebay say spoofed e-mails are a serious problem and undermine costumers' confidence in doing business online.

Internet security advisers warn never to give out log-in information over e-mail.

Written by CBC News Online staff


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Canada; Crime/Corruption; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: ebay; fraud; freepbay
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To: PatrioticCowboy
Notwithstanding some technical problems like account hijacking, EBay spells the end of the state monopoly on contract enforcement. Essentially for the last 1000 years or so the state has held itself as the enforcer of good information and good behavior. Now that monopoly is threatened so of course they will highlight any fraud they find and try their hardest to regulate it.
21 posted on 09/14/2003 3:41:24 AM PDT by palmer (paid for by the "Lazamataz for Supreme Ruler" campaign.)
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To: PatrioticCowboy
Representatives from Ebay say spoofed e-mails are a serious problem and undermine costumers' confidence in doing business online.

I always fill out the forms in the spoofed Ebay messages:
Name: Mongoo Bloofus, Jr.
Bank Name: First Wiccan Security
work phone: (bogus area code)
home number: (more bogus)
email address: (hmmmm...... could get interesting here)
email password: ....

Maybe just use a recently created web based email account filled with lots of false leads.... the criminal could actually be caught when he trys to follow one of the false leads.
22 posted on 09/14/2003 3:56:10 AM PDT by Maurice Tift
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To: Swordmaker
Often, the buyer seems to have moved to another continent... people who had selling used CDs and books from New Jersey is suddenly offering large numbers of "too-good-to-be-true" impossible to get computers from the Netherlands... or the UK... of Australia. Sometimes the item location is listed as New York, but the price is listed in Australian dollars.

Well, well...Sounds exactly like the operation that is selling the new Canon G5 digital camera at a fraction of its $800 price!

23 posted on 09/14/2003 4:23:53 AM PDT by Gorzaloon (Contents may have settled during shipping, but this tagline contains the stated product weight.)
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To: lainde
I'm a seller and leave negative feedback all the time. I've never once gotten an email from eBay asking me to use "Dispute Resolution." Your assumption that it was a fraudulent message is correct. I stopped forwarding the fraudulent eBay messages I've gotten to eBay. They've become too numerous to mention. I believe I received three in one day last week. They're almost as annoying as the ones for Viagra.
24 posted on 09/14/2003 4:52:49 AM PDT by mass55th
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To: palmer
Yep. I get the feelng the end result will be legislation that cracks down on E-Bay, not the scammers. What were thinking, anyway? Entering into voluntary retail deals without govenrment interference. That's just crazy!
25 posted on 09/14/2003 5:04:29 AM PDT by Wolfie
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To: Swordmaker
Good for you!

You are to be commended for your dilligence in eporting to eBay as well as being clever enough to spot the fraud.

As someone who loves both eBay and Apple computers, all I can say is "Thanks" for making the eBay community a little safer!

Kudos!

Tia

26 posted on 09/14/2003 5:13:07 AM PDT by tiamat ("Just a Bronze-Age Gal, Trapped in a Techno World!")
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To: Wolfie
Shopping sheeple seeking safety.
27 posted on 09/14/2003 5:20:31 AM PDT by palmer (paid for by the "Lazamataz for Supreme Ruler" campaign.)
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To: Swordmaker
I have one problem with eBay's commitment to fighting this type of fraud. They make it extremely HARD to find a way to report suspicious listings to them... it is buried under many layers of webpages and options. It took me over an hour to find it the first time I saw one of these scam offerings.
Boy, you aren't kidding about the "report a fraudulent auction" link being ridiculously hard to find. The ebay "help" system mentions it several times, but the pages that say things like "click the link below" never actually have the link below!

I gave up last time I was looking for it and just used google to find it.

Report trouble auctions to ebay.

Ebay UK uses the older (and easier) version of the fraud reporting form here.

(I always figured ebay should have a "report abuse" link on each aucition like how FR has one next to each post, but I guess that would just make too much damn sense.)

28 posted on 09/14/2003 7:12:00 AM PDT by Fixit (Double Your Dubya, Reelect George W. Bush)
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To: PatrioticCowboy
Ebay customers also sometimes receive e-mail messages that appear to be from Ebay, but are actually from someone trying to rip them off.

They're called "spoof" e-mails. They look authentic, carrying the Ebay logo and an Ebay return address.

They threaten to cancel customers' accounts if they don't reply with their account information.

This is old news, about 2 or 3 years old. Ebay has stated they NEVER e-mail you for personal information.

I would believe that the same people who fell for this also opened the virus attachments in the "I love you" virus e-mails.

29 posted on 09/14/2003 7:17:42 AM PDT by Paul C. Jesup
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To: mass55th
This hits close to home. I'm in the middle of a problem where it appears that a stolen item was sold over ebay. I suspect this is just the tip of a major iceberg.
30 posted on 09/14/2003 7:18:55 AM PDT by RichardW
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To: PatrioticCowboy
Is fraud very common at Ebay?

It is not so much the fraud on the sellers' side that is the problem, but stupidity on the buyers' side.

Like the quote says: If it is too good to be true, it usually is.

31 posted on 09/14/2003 7:20:56 AM PDT by Paul C. Jesup
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To: PatrioticCowboy
My wife's Ebay account was compromised last week along with her Yahoo! mail account, within 48 hours of each other. Different passwords on each and never a bogus email received requesting confidential info. Still no resolution from either Ebay or Yahoo! Her accounts are still hijacked. Their response time is extremely poor and, of course, it has to be something WE did on our end, not on their end. You never think it will happen to you, but when it does... No more Yahoo! or Ebay and we will share our experience with friends and family.
32 posted on 09/14/2003 7:25:31 AM PDT by weatherFrEaK
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To: RichardW
"This hits close to home. I'm in the middle of a problem where it appears that a stolen item was sold over ebay. I suspect this is just the tip of a major iceberg."

I hope your problem doesn't turn out to be a major headache. Good luck. I've never bought any large priced items on eBay. Most of the things I've bought are DVD's and books.

33 posted on 09/14/2003 7:32:42 AM PDT by mass55th
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To: mass55th
I'm a seller and leave negative feedback all the time

What annoys me is when you leave negative feedback for someone, they often retaliate, even when they were in the wrong. Happened to me just today. The jerk didn't abide by the auction terms, had neg feedback from other sellers offering similar mdse, and after I left neg fb, he retaliated. What a jerkwad...

eBay needs to have a way to remove this kind of feedback.

34 posted on 09/14/2003 7:36:42 AM PDT by Tuxedo (In Stereo Where Available)
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To: mass55th
I have this nagging feeling that I have stumbled into a major fencing operation. I've been in touch with the jurisdiction where I purchased the item.
35 posted on 09/14/2003 7:38:24 AM PDT by RichardW
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To: PatrioticCowboy
No, it's safe, you just have to make sure you KNOW what you are buying.
36 posted on 09/14/2003 7:40:00 AM PDT by Porterville (I spell stuff wrong sometimes, get over yourself, you're not that great.)
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To: Swordmaker
I think there is a threshold for me when I am no longer going to send money off to an unknown without the online escrow services. It would kick in way before $1900
37 posted on 09/14/2003 7:50:15 AM PDT by xp38
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To: Tuxedo
"eBay needs to have a way to remove this kind of feedback."

The negative feedback I leave is always because individuals fail to pay me, and I do this after a 26-30 day period has passed. I've had negative feedback left for me too by those buyers. In many cases, eBay will eventually remove that feedback or reduce it to a neutral because the person who left it ends up being suspended because they've bilked several other sellers. I've gotten to the point where I don't even care about the feedback anymore. But I refuse to be intimidated about leaving negative feedback for fear of getting it back in turn from some slug.

It never ceases to amaze me that many of these buyers who don't pay you, contact you or send a payment after you've already left negative feedback for them. I've had several write me and ask me if they can pay and if I'd request a reverse on the non-paying status they've been given by eBay. They begin to panic once they see that negative on their record. I've also gotten notes from people who have been banned from eBay because of their payment record. They beg to be able to pay for the items and in many cases, it's months past the time of their transaction with me and I no longer have the item. In any case, once I receive the credit for the closing fee from eBay and I leave negative feedback, I usually don't reverse it. I figure they wasted my time, failed to answer any of my emails, failed to pay within a reasonable time (approx. 30 days) and don't deserve any favors.

38 posted on 09/14/2003 7:52:14 AM PDT by mass55th
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To: PatrioticCowboy
There's still a lot of good stuff there, but you have to be a careful buyer. I usually sell a few things a year on there, just to dump some of my aging electronics, and I've had major problems in the last year or so with deadbeat buyers. Even ones who have good feedback. In my own experience, this is a new phenomenon.
39 posted on 09/14/2003 7:58:02 AM PDT by July 4th
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To: Swordmaker
They make it extremely HARD to find a way to report suspicious listings to them... it is buried under many layers of webpages and options.

Not only that, because of all of the embedded crap in those fraudulent e-mails, just opening one so that you can forward it to spoof@ebay.com tells the crooks that they've got a "live one." I seem to get one or two of these bogus e-mails on the weekends, and I have already forwarded about 4 of them to ebay when I found this out.

During the initial phase of the blaster/welchia virus activity, I started using a program called b9, which filters crap that it considers "non-standard" out of e-mails. Examples of things that it will filter are read receipts (every one of these e-mails was sending one back), attachments that contain scripts (viruses included), non-standard html tags and attributes, scripting, embedded and undesired tags, images from external servers, images that pass variables to external servers, images that appear to contain identifier information, images associated with cookie information, and 1x1 images.

In one of the fraudulent e-mails, b9 filtered out 48 separate items from the e-mail. If you don't have the ability to filter this crap out before you forward to e-bay, you are better off just deleting the message and making sure that your e-mail is not set up so that you don't view it in a preview pane.

40 posted on 09/14/2003 8:03:58 AM PDT by RedWhiteBlue
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