Scammers hijack hundreds of eBay user names and passwords daily through fake emails and other sophisticated phishing schemes or purchase them routinely for sale on the internet. If you recieve an e-mail from ebay, PayPal or any Banking institutuion never use the link provided to log in to the website. Always go the the website directly then log in. The e-mails look real and if you Buy and Sell on ebay you could be fooled into thinking someone on ebay is simply asking you a question about your item.
Once the scammer hijacks established eBay user ID's they will upload anywhere from 1 to 500 or more FAKE Auctions and try to lure unsuspecting eBayers into negotiating BUY NOW , outside of eBay, pay via Western Union for this safe and "good deal." The buyers assume the person is legit because the are established on ebay and have positive feedback and many sales.
These are the Common Signs of Fake Auctions:
An incredibly low price advertising "BUY IT NOW" in auction description but NO "Buy It Now" Button in top of the Auction.
Item listed in a WRONG category. (They want you to believe they made a listing error, and that is the reason nobody has bid on it. It also gets passed some of the ebay fraud screening).
Bidders User ID kept private : Scammers keep USER ID's of bidders hidden so they cannot be seen or warned by other ebay members. Scammers shill (bid up) each others auctions to artifically inflate the price and try to create action on their scam auctions. Unfortunately shilling is also done by legitimate ebay sellers so if you every notice repeat bidders on one sellers auctions, report them to ebay. Our services use software to screen for this but ebay has made it harder to do.
Short Listings 1, 2 or 3 day listings: Legitimate sellers put up expensive items on auctions for 7 or 10 days ( the longer the auction the more time people have to view it thus it gets more bids and usually sells for a higher price. Scammers who hijacked anothers account cannot afford to risk that the real account owner or the eBay Security Team will discover the hijacked account and thus you'll see those 1 day - 2 day auctions for expensive items.
Seller Location and Item Location are different : If the item is in California and the Seller is in China, which we often see, be very leary.
Free Shipping or Shipping Charges that do not make sense: No legitimate seller would sell an item for a third of what is is worth and throw in free shipping especailly if it is coming from another country. They may say the item is in the United States as a confidence builder.
A change in a "Sellers Merchandise Pattern": Seller listed many high priced items in their other auctions or store, all listed at the same time but if you check their past feedback they never sold similar items before or high priced items. If the seller usually sells antiques and all of the sudden they are selling high end appliances, stereo equipment and electronics, then be leary. If they usually sell low end items and all of the sudden have expensive items, be leary.
Seller puts their email address directly in the auction text, even puts up their own contact the seller form. This is the core of their scam.
Their goal is to get you to contact them using other means than "Ask Seller a Question" link located on top right hand side of the auction page, just under the Read Feedback Comments Link. Instead the Scammer wants you to use the email provided in the auction text (They may even say they will be out of town and can only be contacted at this e-mail ) Or worse the scammer puts up "CONTACT ME/US FORM" - if you fill out such a form and click submit - there is a good chance you'll see a fake login screen which will ask for your user ID and password. ( Which they will steal) The scammer usually does not change hijacked Victims eBay account settings because eBay sends automatic notification to the original owner's email address alerting account owners that someone changed their contact email address on their account and the ture owner would be contacted right away.
Bellow are some examples of fake auctions on ebay. Search for some of the key items we have listed under our "Hot Scam Items Page". Click on the "Sort By" box and change it to "Newly Listed Auctions" (1 -3 day listings) and you will see items advertised by scammers starting at $1.00 with Buy It Now links in the listing, offering the item for way bellow the actual cost. It has been going on for years and educating yourself or using our services will help your weed out the legitimate sellers from the fraudulent sellers.
