eBay vs. Romania's Online Scammers

spinctrl links to an interesting story in the L.A. Times about the cloak-and-daggerism of fighting online scams in Romania, summing it up like this: "The country is the top source of auction site scams. One company is trying to do something about it, with increasing collaboration from local law enforcement over recent years. Ebay has sent over equipment and a team to help the authorities combat this form of cyber crime, which is run with all the organization of an industrial-scale business."

Nice image piece

[SuperBanana]

Slashdot story about ebay sitting on its hands and doing nothing when given proof of fraud, complete with stories from slashdotters who used to work for ebay: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/12/16/1316203&tid=95&tid=98&tid=123 [slashdot.org]

This guy adds in his own personal experience, where eBay wanted a $25 fee to handle a fraud case: http://danwarne.com/ebay-fraud-under-scrutiny/ [danwarne.com]

In 2002, ebay sits on its hands and does nothing when given evidence of fraud: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3078736/ [msn.com]

FTC says Ebay is the #1 source of online fraud complaints (circa 2003): http://www.news.com/FTC,-states-take-on-online-auction-fraud/2100-1017_3-999009.html [news.com]

Still a problem in 2004: http://www.nclnet.org/news/2004/internet_fraud_stats.htm [nclnet.org]

...and the beat goes on! Just google "ebay fraud" and see hundreds of news stories and personal accounts...

I recall reading a few years ago that eBay was a source of something like 75% of all complaints about online fraud. Just yesterday I saw an item for sale by a guy with a positive rating of something like 24,000. Unless he's selling 6 items a day for the last 10 years, I see nothing has changed.

Re:Nice image piece

[Anonymous Coward]

As a former employee of eBay and someone who still has friends who work there, I know that eBay does in fact take fraud seriously. They are also a serious target. And there are legions of people who seem to think that eBay is out there trying to screw people over. They are not. EBay fully understands how the fraud is hurting their business.

There is a lot that goes on behind the scenes that is not publicly discussed.

I can't agree with you

[gr8dude]

I happen to be living in Moldova, a small country which probably scores worse than Romania if you check it with your "country-o-meter".Romania is our Western neighbor (the really long story is that our countries used to be united, but this is just FYI).

A lot of times I have to deal with the fact that an online-store does not deliver to Moldova, so either I have to know someone abroad (who lives in a "good" country and can make the purchase for me) or forget about the product.

But hey, we're people too! We are intelligent, reasonable, we have feelings, we trust other people, and other people trust us. Simply 'blacklisting' a country is not a good solution, because it still leaves a lot of unhappy folk.

I even had cases in which some companies refused to sell software (no export control regulations involved), all they have to do is send me an email with the registration number _after_ the money is transferred to their account; but no...

What the hell will I do? Stick my hand into "teh tubes", grab their necks and then suck them into the abyss?

In other words, item#1 in your list should be removed, imho.

Re:Nice image piece

[Giovanni666]

Here ya go. Ebay has been caught in so many lies about their crappy security it is not funny. Anyone remember that thing about the credit card numbers getting posted on the Trust & Safety forum on 9-25-2007? They lied through their teeth and tried to cover it all up.

http://auctionguild.blogspot.com/2007/09/has-your-ebay-account-been-compromised.html [blogspot.com] http://www.firemeg.com/2007/09/ebay-inc-proof-of-hacking-video-pulled.html [firemeg.com] http://budmalcolm.bravejournal.com/entry/24291 [bravejournal.com]

They also threatened, intimidated, and blackballed websites that had dared to post the facts about them being hacked. http://auctionguild.com/generic150.html [auctionguild.com]

What about the massive hack & hijacking attacks all summer long? Looky here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2Xufh1VVzY [youtube.com] 60 thousand fake items! They tried to cover all that up too. They pulled threads about it warning people in record time, while the fake listings stayed up forever, and kept coming.

Simply put, ebay is hacked. Ebay is dishonest. ebay has been caught too many times in too many falsehoods to ever be trusted by any reasonable person again. Let me also remind everyone that ebay is sending bills to the hijack victims, & trying some strongarm tactics to make the victims pay. http://www.ebaymotorssucks.com/scams032707.htm [ebaymotorssucks.com]

To top everything off, the ebay execs have been dumping their own stock like there is no tomorrow.

Does anyone really trust this creepy outfit?

Re:It's easy to avoid

[0100010001010011]

And if I decide to scam you with paypal how is it any different?

All I need to open an Emigrant Direct account is a few numbers (which probably aren't hard to come by). I can link the paypal account to the emigrant direct account then flush it out from there.

Congratulations, so ebay knows you've paid. If the money isn't in the account, it's gone. Kiss it good by. Ask me how my Shiny new G5 tower is that I never got. I went through PayPal I was young and dumb. I got the stamp of approval of a "protected" auction.

I'm now short $2k and a G5. Nothing seemed to good to be true... PayPal was thankfully able to recover $200 out of the account.

Thanks PayPal!

Ebay = Expensive

[EEPROMS]

Am I the only one finding Ebay is more expensive than the normal on-line shops or even real retail shops. I recently decided to purchase a HP C6180 printer (works great with Linux) and the best price I found was AU$249 from a normal big brand retail chain. When I looked as Ebay the best (buy now) price was over AU$329 at the time with the best on-line retailer price being AU$304 (with another printer thrown in as a bonus). Im finding that if you want to buy any "new" product, ebay is the worst place to go if you want to save money. On the other hand second hand goods on ebay can sometimes be a good deal.