Fraudulent Buyers and emails

[Devin Vaghela]

Don’t be a victim!


I received an offer for an amp I had on sale on a well known trading platform, not the most well known!

“ Buyer” offered full asking price, provided an email and requested me to email them if still available

Hmmm, I thought, interesting.

Email communication followed.

They requested to pay via Paypal as they felt safer this way, sure, no problem. I requested to know who was picking up / courier, and the appropriate contact.

They confirmed they would make payment and arrange a company courier.

I said, okay!

Next, I received a service email, supposed from paypal ([email protected]<buyers email>).

Looked very authentic.

It mentions payment rec’d, amount in excess of asking price, with particulars to forward the extra money to courier, with a phishing link to click on for more details.

Simultaneous email from “buyer” to help pay the difference to the courier, as he was having trouble doing the transfer!

In this email is the name of the beneficiary (courier) , account and sort-code.

Obviously forwarded to Paypal, may even send it to the online fraud office.

Just highlights how porous these sites are, how vigilant one must be and the world we live in!

Lesson learnt.

 

[Darth Vader]

Nothing new I was seeing this sort of thing a long time ago (I used to be a scam baiter). The scammer overpays, apologises and asks you to keep some for your trouble and pass the rest of the 'over' payment on. A few days later after you have made the xfer the original sum disappears from you bank account i.e. its returned to its rightful owner whose bank account was hijacked by the scambug and you are left with a loss and a possible police charge of money laundering.

You forget that 50% of the Worlds population is poorer than our poorest in the UK so we look to them as a filthy rich people ripe to be cheated out of our 'loadsa' money. The intelligence of very poor people follows the same gaussian distribution as that for us wealthy people which means that they have some highly intelligent people ready to be put to work by the criminal/gangster class that provides the necessary resources.

Cheers,

DV

 

[Devin Vaghela]

Wow! I am as yet green to all this!

Its difficult to gauge genuine buyers on other platforms and it would be a shame to approach with cynicism.

 

[padam]

Same happened to me on facebook adverts a few times as well. I think they are relatively easy to spot, I am just disappointed that the platforms do not care too much to block them from doing it again.

Ebay is also filled with dozens of fake auctions (with an image and an email address "drawn" in it, usually the same font)
Really hard to believe that there is no system to prevent them from posting again, in the same way spam filters work with email.
Instead, it is "totally normal" that on every page there are scam auctions, and they don't mind at all if people need to spend more time on their page just to scroll through (or report) them.

 

[mikeyb]

Had an email supposedly form Talktalk claiming that my broadband payment had failed and could I please log in to my account via the link supplied and sort the issue.

My new Talktalk username is Fuk Yu, I won’t list the password for fear of offending anyone

NEVER EVER click on any link in any email unless you know who sent it, I usually just go right to the website and ignore any email links, even from known senders, trust no one is my motto, touch wood it’s worked so far

 

[essgee]

Slight thread drift, I remember using a "similar" password at a work location many years ago. Company decided to have a policy to change your log-on every 30 days, was away for longer than that and finding I could not get in to the system phoned up IT. Lady at IT asked my reason for the call, I explained so she asked for old password. I said I would spell it out rather than say it, very similar to the one mentioned above. Cue much laughter at IT end of phone.

 

[RJohan]

Just an hour ago while watching on dailymotion, the video was interupted with a message from my ISP that they congratulated me bla bla, and a couple of buttons to click on! Yeah, sure...

This happened to friend:

In the airport security gate he left his wallet on the conveyor belt while walking through the gate. The guy behinf the counter very quickly took out the credit card from the wallet and scanned it under the counter!!!!

 

[Ponty]

I had the old HMRC ‘refund due, click here‘ message yesterday. Yeah right, in my dreams...

With HiFi, it’s why I only buy and sell stuff on here within a trusted community.

 

[RJohan]

Slight thread drift, I remember using a "similar" password at a work location many years ago. Company decided to have a policy to change your log-on every 30 days, was away for longer than that and finding I could not get in to the system phoned up IT. Lady at IT asked my reason for the call, I explained so she asked for old password. I said I would spell it out rather than say it, very similar to the one mentioned above. Cue much laughter at IT end of phone.

The idea that changing the password every month actually doesn't work very well. It's not as if the crook, after somehow getting hold of it, sits down and wait for a couple of weeks, he will use it as quick as he can.
Another false idea is that using a password with a random mix of small and capital letters and numbers is safer. Safe is using a LONG password, preferably something you remember without having to write it down. Just don't use something that relate to you as a person, like using your childrens name! Or 'Donaldduck'.