[HN Gopher] How I got scammed on Facebook Marketplace (2023)
___________________________________________________________________
How I got scammed on Facebook Marketplace (2023)
Author : bdlowery
Score : 108 points
Date : 2024-02-07 17:25 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (ben.page)
(TXT) w3m dump (ben.page)
| RajT88 wrote:
| Wow, for once a PayPal story where someone didn't get screwed.
| soco wrote:
| Only because they reached to a real person who listened to the
| details. Arguably that was also the source of the scam in the
| first place, so I'm not sure whether to rejoice or be angry.
| behnamoh wrote:
| > someone didn't get screwed
|
| Someone did get escrowed tho.
| janus24 wrote:
| > The next morning, I called PayPal and asked them how the seller
| could've opened a case on my behalf against themselves. They
| weren't sure.
|
| That's scary :/
| lakpan wrote:
| I think this is the worst part of the event.
|
| PayPal is the most annoying service I use because it asks for
| 2FA for every damn action. So how could they take that action?
| Surely if they logged in they left breadcrumbs?
|
| The post is mildly infuriating because it doesn't even try to
| answer very important that question.
| emayljames wrote:
| They provide a possible reason, that being mobile number
| spoofing and calling the call center
| gertlex wrote:
| This might be an option you turned on? I don't experience 2FA
| for paypal... But I'll probably go fix that today.
| TonyTrapp wrote:
| I'm pretty sure it's part of "the algorithm". I don't get
| 2FA prompts every time, but ever so often for it to be
| annoying - especially since I am then thrown back to the
| login prompt which dares to tell me that the password from
| my password manager was wrong. No, it wasn't wrong, your
| system apparently just cannot handle going from a password
| prompt to 2FA and then realizing that the correct password
| was already entered! I asked lots of people around me and
| they don't have this issue, so I guess it's kinda random
| who is treated how.
| ssl-3 wrote:
| It is apparently very inconsistent.
|
| My own experience with using PayPal usually (as in:
| almost always) goes like this:
|
| I get a PayPal popup that says something like "You're
| already logged in! One moment," and then once that goes
| away I push the whatever button corresponds to "Yeah,
| sure -- pay it."
|
| It's generally a one-button operation for me, and has
| been for years.
|
| I wonder what the differentiation is.
| binsquare wrote:
| Agreed on the yikes here - this should be a high priority
| issue from paypal's side to address.
|
| This seems like a HUGE loophole
| ellisv wrote:
| Eh, I'm sure PayPal _could_ see how it happened but the
| relatively low level support person wouldn 't have access to
| such information.
| purpleflame1257 wrote:
| When I do FB marketplace I go cash and in-person. It lets you
| assess the quality of whatever you're buying.
| Sohcahtoa82 wrote:
| This is the way.
|
| Does FB Marketplace even have any sort of reputation system? Or
| are you banking entirely on the age of the account?
|
| I'm a heavy Facebook user, but I avoid FB Marketplace like the
| plague. Just seems like a great place to get scammed.
| RajT88 wrote:
| I've had good success with a couple buyers who mail stuff
| over marketplace.
|
| I used the same criteria: Number of items listed, number of
| items sold, how long they have been on the platform. For good
| measure, I cyber stalk them a little bit to make sure they
| exist.
|
| Even with an Ebay-like ratings system, one of the thing which
| happens is legit accounts get hacked and go rogue. (I am
| guessing they got hacked; someone who was legit could also
| just randomly decide to go rogue) You're always going to be
| at risk of that.
| emayljames wrote:
| I got scammed from a FB advert selling clothing, turned out
| the company is a scam and sends nothing, FB have allowed them
| to still advertise for months still.
| RajT88 wrote:
| I get downvoted for saying this every time I post it here,
| but a huge number of facebook adverts are scams of various
| sorts.
|
| Some are as you say - you order something and never receive
| it. Straight up
|
| Some are fast fashion companies which get spun up quickly
| with slick ads and websites, which are somehow "going out
| of business" even though they were registered less than 2
| months ago.
|
| Some are kickstarters for products which obviously are just
| clones of other products which already are ubiquitous.
|
| A lot are drop shippers who use slick ads to sell you
| something they aren't even in possession of, at 2-3x the
| price which you could get it for if you just took the time
| to look elsewhere.
| sokoloff wrote:
| The last of those is at least a value-added service for
| some people.
| emayljames wrote:
| yes, they fit this pattern exactly. I only discovered
| this issue after being scammed. There are hundreds of
| people for example who got scammed by a company
| advertising dolphin blankets, as described by reddit
| users who where victims of it, and the adverts and
| company have still not been taken down by FB.
| meindnoch wrote:
| "Sadly, we're closing our shop... :( The whole inventory
| is 80% off while the stocks last."
|
| Oldest trick in the book.
| burningChrome wrote:
| Back in the day, you'd see some semi-truck park in a lot
| and then two dudes with thick AF Southern accents would
| get out and tell people they tried to deliver all these
| items to the warehouse, but the warehouse refused the
| shipment (insert various reasons why) and they can't go
| back to Ken-tuck-yee without getting rid of it all.
|
| They said they're selling (furniture, electronics,
| clothing, art) it all for 80-90% off retail. You know,
| just so they get it off the truck and get back home. I
| remember working in a commercial area and the owner of
| the business would come and tell the guys to GTFO their
| property so they'd pull out and then pull into the next
| driveway over and rinse and repeat until they were out of
| the area.
|
| It was a total scam though. My boss bought some couch and
| said it started falling apart after a few months. I'm not
| sure these guys had stolen all the stuff, or if the truck
| got hijacked our what, but during the Summer it was a
| regular thing that happened a few times every month.
|
| I'd be interested to find out if anybody else remembers
| these "truck load" scams in the late 90's early aughts.
| EdwardDiego wrote:
| It's a great place to get goods cheap. Stolen goods, that is.
| dawnerd wrote:
| Or just stay away from people selling brand new products
| below msrp.
| jolt42 wrote:
| Since I only deal with "in person" sales, to me it's less
| sketchy than most eBay purchases. I had a similar happening
| to this story, but with eBay. I don't know why they bothered
| trying the scam, I got my money back relatively easy, just
| had to be patient.
| astura wrote:
| >I avoid FB Marketplace like the plague. Just seems like a
| great place to get scammed
|
| There are scams but I think they are avoidable.
|
| My next door neighbor has spent many thousands of dollars on
| FB Marketplace and has never been scammed. He buys tools and
| construction supplies and equipment. Usually gets the stuff
| 90%+ off retail price and sometimes free.
|
| I think the key is dealing in person.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Yeah treat it like Gumtree, Craigslist, Newspaper Ad or carboot
| sale. Why do anything else?
| s0rce wrote:
| That limits you to buying stuff locally, its a good precaution
| but means you can't buy anything that is only available further
| away. I've had good luck buying stuff so far and saved money, I
| certainly could have got scammed and that would suck.
| the_snooze wrote:
| >That limits you to buying stuff locally, its a good
| precaution but means you can't buy anything that is only
| available further away.
|
| To me, that's an entirely reasonable trade-off. You sacrifice
| the breadth of the market available to you in exchange for
| greatly reducing your attack surface. You'll easily filter
| out the legions of machine-assisted international scammers if
| you require transactions to be in-person with cash.
| bluGill wrote:
| Like most people - I have a niche interest that doesn't
| have a large market locally. When I want something that
| everyone in the country has there is no problem. When I
| want something unusual though I need to expand to a larger
| market than local to have a chance of finding it.
| gnicholas wrote:
| I know others have had good success with FB Marketplace, but
| man I only see scams. I've posted stuff there and on Nextdoor
| and CL, and I get 10x the number of scam buyers on FB. I
| stopped even trying to post stuff there, since it was all chaff
| and no wheat. Kind of surprising, considering I live in SV,
| just a few miles from FB HQ. I'd think there would be plenty of
| legit users here!
| wvenable wrote:
| I've bought and sold so much stuff on Facebook marketplace.
| Almost always in person and in cash and always a good
| experience.
|
| At least one time I broke the rule and actually sent money up
| front for an item but the seller packaged up and sent it
| right away. The amount was low enough that I wasn't worried
| about losing it, the item was pretty unique, and I spent a
| bunch of time checking on things before I decided to trust.
| paxys wrote:
| I've bought/sold hundreds of items on FB Marketplace and
| never had a problem. The quality and response rate is
| significantly better than Craigslist, Nextdoor and others.
| The simple rule is - local, in-person meetup and cash only.
| If someone insists on anything else then just block and
| report them.
| khalilravanna wrote:
| Same. Only time I ever dealt with shipping on FB marketplace
| was the time I was selling my Steam Deck and some guy didn't
| want to drive. So I said "How about I list it on eBay so we're
| both protected, send you the link, and you buy it there". He
| was on board and it worked well. Of course I had to eat eBay's
| fee but better than getting scammed.
| javajosh wrote:
| Interesting story - I wonder how they managed to manipulate the
| Paypal account of the victim. Clearly Paypal has a problem there.
|
| But the other issue is that of general lawlessness and the fact
| that this scammer will get away with the attempted scamming, and
| probably do it to other people, too. For every person like the OP
| who manage, somehow, to protect themselves, there are 1000 others
| who don't. And there is the issue that the scammer broke the law,
| in their state and in the victims state, and probably federally,
| and yet there will be no action from law-enforcement. In such an
| environment, _why not_ go into this kind of business? What 's the
| downside? It seems to me that there isn't any downside. Sort of
| like committing perjury.
|
| In general, how bad does it have to get before the law gets
| enforced?
| axus wrote:
| The author had a theory: "I'm still not sure how the scammer
| was able to open and close cases on my behalf. My theory is
| that they were able to spoof my phone number and call PayPal
| support and do it over the phone. (They asked early on for my
| phone number "for the tracking information," which in
| retrospect doesn't make a lot of sense.)"
| semolino wrote:
| In my experience, you can log in to Paypal/eBay by supplying
| your email address, then choosing "another way to sign in"
| (other than PW), at which point you're prompted to enter a
| single use code sent thru SMS. So: phone spoofing sounds
| likely, and it's my guess the scammers were operating without
| even having to use Paypal support to close the tickets.
| dexzod wrote:
| Well if any one can log into paypal and open and close cases,
| they might as well just use the paypal account to pay
| themselves directly or buy stuff. I don't understand why the
| seller had to use FB to scam people when they could manipulate
| the paypal account directly
| edent wrote:
| There's a lovely line in the original BitCoin paper which says:
|
| > Transactions that are computationally impractical to reverse
| would protect sellers from fraud, and routine escrow mechanisms
| could easily be implemented to protect buyers.
|
| The word "easily" is doing a lot of the heavy lifting there!
| Escrow is a difficult problem to solve. There is no infallible
| smart-contract which can protect both buyers and sellers. There's
| just a lot of messy human interaction which - if the stakes are
| high enough - can only be resolved in court.
|
| Are PayPal's protections sloppy? Probably. Is Facebook
| Marketplace a cess-pit? Mostly. Can technology solve a cultural
| problem? I think we all know the answer to that!
| yieldcrv wrote:
| There have been routine escrow mechanisms on bitcoin for 10
| years?
|
| Its a very lucrative side business to operate those?
|
| They involve humans, they also involve multisignature accounts
| and smart contracts just like the white paper inspired or
| imagined 15 years ago. Its been one of the biggest boons for
| crypto native commerce, even when automated by the marketplace
| when the local government doesnt like a website they no longer
| have been able to seize the funds found in the server because
| buyer and seller just invalidate the escrow account from the
| multisig and reconcile money deposited/in transit.
|
| These services are far cheaper than escrow agents I've seen on
| marketplaces that dont involve paypal, far faster than those
| and paypal, and about comparable in cost to paypal goods and
| service but mostly cheaper at around 1% instead of 2.89-3.49%.
| But thats mainly from lack of competition.
|
| Given that paypal offers crypto merchant services, this decade,
| its far more likely that paypal will get in the crypto escrow
| game too
|
| and maybe next decade HN collective conscious will catch up to
| a point that these kinds of comments wont appear in HN threads
| at all, in favor of people showing us _their_ escrow contract
| just like they do for their random libraries and products in
| the rest of the tech space
| WheatMillington wrote:
| >There have been routine escrow mechanisms on bitcoin for 10
| years? Its a very lucrative side business to operate those?
|
| Are those questions?
| yieldcrv wrote:
| No, they are exclamations!
| dEnigma wrote:
| Seems like you missed the mark then
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Cryptocurrency is kind of the opposite if escrow. Especially
| the complex stuff like smart contracts. It is more "technical
| wizard who hacks it takes all!" with zero recourse.
| EdwardDiego wrote:
| Code is law bud. Wait, not the actual code, the code I meant
| to write without a bug that could be exploited.
| latchkey wrote:
| Is it possible that the scammer works for paypal or has someone
| on the inside with access to open and close tickets?
| rssoconnor wrote:
| > (They asked early on for my phone number "for the tracking
| information," which in retrospect doesn't make a lot of sense.)
|
| When I have shipped parcels (legitimately to people I know
| personally), the courier services have a place on the form for
| phone numbers. And I do generally try to make sure I fill in an
| accurate phone number.
| gnicholas wrote:
| Came here to point out the same thing. I guess when dealing
| with internet randos, it's best to keep your real digits to
| yourself (or at least use a phone number that isn't linked to
| your PayPal account).
| paxys wrote:
| > I paid $1,030 using PayPal
|
| Stopped reading right there. I don't know why anyone thinks this
| kind of transaction will ever work out in their favor. FB
| Marketplace/Craigslist etc. are fine, but the golden rule is to
| use them for local, in-person, cash-only exchanges and nothing
| else.
| s1mon wrote:
| Bingo. It's about as obvious as the people who are surprised
| when their car gets broken into and then they tell you that
| their backpack was visible.
| nradov wrote:
| Believe it or not, in most of the USA you can leave a
| backpack visible in your car and it won't get broken into.
| It's only some shithole cities where this is a serious
| problem. So, it's unsurprising that many people would be
| surprised by that particular type of crime.
|
| Online marketplace scams are prevalent pretty much
| _everywhere_ because the scammers can use fake accounts and
| are often in another country.
| toss1 wrote:
| If so, the idea you can safely leave stuff in a car is the
| triumph of anecdotes over data.
|
| Long ago when starting a software & network company, I got
| a commercial insurance policy on the computer equipment. It
| covered _everything_ , suprisingly including the usual
| exceptions such as war, terrorism, Acts Of God, lightning,
| fire, etc.
|
| But, there was ONE thing it did not cover:
|
| "Theft from an unattended motor vehicle".
|
| I took the hint and to this day never leave anything in a
| parked car, and never had anything stolen, and I have
| friends who didn't follow it and have been robbed that way,
| sometimes literally in <10 min. I know people in some areas
| (and these aren't bad areas, parking at beaches, yacht
| clubs, ski areas, etc.) who leave their cars unlocked with
| trunklids popped open.
|
| The actuaries have data and know some things ordinary
| people don't.
|
| When you get that info, listen.
| nradov wrote:
| Theft from a parked car would typically be covered under
| an auto or homeowners insurance policy, and most of those
| contain no such exclusions (although there are limits on
| covered losses). I don't understand what point you're
| trying to make by bringing up commercial insurance which
| is irrelevant to most people.
| lazide wrote:
| That the actuaries of that insurance know it was such a
| big problem they expressly excluded it.
|
| Also, many auto and homeowners insurance policies have
| low (or no) coverage for personal property theft in cases
| like this, at least for computers, etc. unless you
| expressly pay for it.
| Sohcahtoa82 wrote:
| I knew a woman that legit would frequently leave her purse in
| her passenger seat. Told her it was only a matter of time
| before someone broke in, but she just insisted that she hated
| carrying it around, and would just pull out her credit card
| from it when needed.
|
| Sure enough, her window got smashed and her purse was stolen,
| and she was all Surprised Pikachu. She legit didn't think it
| would ever happen.
|
| And you know what...I really don't think it's victim blaming
| when the victim not only didn't do anything to protect
| themselves, but even took action to make themselves a prime
| target. Leaving a purse in sight? Might as well just leave
| cash on the dashboard. She could have _at least_ put her
| purse in her trunk or glove box, somewhere it can 't be seen.
| ryandrake wrote:
| I don't know how "victim blaming" became such a taboo.
| There are plenty of cases where the victim could have
| avoided the problem entirely by taking easy, sensible
| precautions, but nowadays if you point those things out
| (for the benefit of future potential victims), you're an
| evil Victim Blamer. People have agency--we're not just
| helpless sheep walking through life getting inevitably
| victimized by things totally beyond our control. It should
| be OK to talk about preventative measures.
| Sohcahtoa82 wrote:
| It became taboo because people victim-blame in cases
| where it's entirely unwarranted.
|
| For example, in cases of rape, some people will ask what
| she was wearing, as if that actually has anything to do
| with it.
| s0rce wrote:
| Without knowing what proportion of non-local transactions are
| scams its hard to say that this is reasonable. I've used ebay
| and facebook for non-local purchases and not been scammed. I do
| my best do to due diligence and then hope.
| WheatMillington wrote:
| >> Stopped reading right there.
|
| You really shouldn't comment on posts you haven't even bothered
| to read.
| personjerry wrote:
| The title should be "How PayPal refunded me for a scam" no?
| behnamoh wrote:
| How the heck such a FB account is not banned yet? The author said
| it was created in 2017.
| emayljames wrote:
| FB has many scam adverts that get reported but never taken
| down, I know as I got scammed from 1 and the company is listed
| online as a fraudulant company, but FB just dont care as they
| make advert money.
| zaltekk wrote:
| I wonder if the scammer is using emails and passwords from a
| breach against Facebook to access "reputable" accounts and then
| posting marketplace listings.
| ochronus wrote:
| When I was still using facebook ages ago, I repeatedly reported
| trivially fake accounts. Every single time they concluded the
| accounts are fine.
| robinsonb5 wrote:
| It hasn't improved - I still do it from time to time, with
| the same results.
| stavros wrote:
| I got scammed for PS60 the other day as well when I wanted to buy
| a Flipper Zero to play around with. I suspected it was a scam,
| but having never had a bad experience on Facebook Marketplace
| before (I only bought face to face), I figured I'd give it the
| benefit of a doubt.
|
| The guy asked me to wire him some money and then disappeared.
| Once I knew what signs to look for, I realized that _all ten_
| people who sold a Flipper Zero on FB were scammers.
| akelly wrote:
| Fake tracking numbers are a common occurrence in scams now.
| Somehow the scammers are getting access to a database of real
| time legitimate tracking numbers, they wait until there's a
| shipment in their database going to the same city as the buyer,
| and then use that tracking number to claim that they shipped the
| package. Maybe they're paying a real merchant for access to their
| shipping database? Or are UPS tracking numbers short enough to
| brute force?
| mimon wrote:
| I think the idea is the scammer just picks a random business in
| the area then ships them an empty box with a real tracking
| number.
| beauzero wrote:
| There are no till drills that are being sold exceptionally
| cheap (~$800 US) and show up as the first google ad that are
| rumored to be an empty box shipped from the country of origin
| (not China) with incorrect paperwork that gets stuck in
| customs. Most people say they get their money back through CC
| or Paypal but maybe a few don't check? Either way it was
| plausible enough that I did not purchase. The market is small
| farmers and hunters planting food plots. You can use an old
| repurposed grain drill if the grass is super short/overgrazed
| and you can fix it, ~$1500 used on marketplace, or buy a
| small 4' (no tires/3 point hitch) no till drill US made low
| end ~$8k. So it is "too good to be true".
| HellsMaddy wrote:
| Maybe one of those sites that come up when you search Google
| for 'track package' is selling tracking numbers?
| bluSCALE4 wrote:
| This is why I HATE providing my phone and banking information.
| Phones are the worst 2FA available yet it unlocks almost all
| doors.
|
| Related to e-marketplaces, I decided to sell something on eBay,
| an account I've had open for many, many years. They decided to
| tell me after the item was listed that I would have to link my
| bank account if I wanted to take the money out and would face
| further restrictions by the end of the month if I don't comply.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| How did the scammer close the ticket?
|
| Zero day on Paypal? Unlikely for a lowly FB scammer to have this.
|
| SMS hijack? Unlikely the OP would have noticed.
|
| Phishing? Maybe... could have been a sophisticated phishing
| attack. Maybe using those fake package delivery SMS messages.
| hasty_pudding wrote:
| They may have a person on the inside.
|
| Whats disturbing is Paypal didnt investigate the issue at all.
| JohnnyD10 wrote:
| In this case, but we aren't aware as to whether this got
| investigated later. I imagine any issues where they lose
| money they will follow up on.
| geor9e wrote:
| I'm assuming paypal customer service just needs name, address,
| and phone number to fully authenticate a caller and perform all
| actions.
| bhouston wrote:
| Been using Marketplace for 5 years with probably +100 items sold.
| Scammers in my experience usually exhibit these traits:
|
| * They have a new account, and have no Marketplace reviews.
|
| * They want it shipped and will pay extra for shipping. (While
| some real sellers will want it shipped, most will come by to pick
| it up.)
|
| * They do not try to low ball you or even negotiate. (Facebook
| sellers are notoriously cheap.)
|
| * There is a sense of urgency and very responsive to messages.
| (Most Facebook sellers are not instantly responsive as they have
| a life.)
|
| I have also seen scam sellers appear as well. They sort of do the
| same thing:
|
| * The price for the items are amazing, a steal.
|
| * They always ship, often for free. You can never pick it up.
|
| * They are very responsible to any messages.
|
| * The account is new.
| sandyarmstrong wrote:
| Interesting. I wonder what the author should have done
| differently. Second paragraph in the article is:
|
| > I bought the camera from a profile that was created in 2017.
| They had some other things for sale, too. The account looked
| legit -- lots of family photos and comments from family
| members.
| bombcar wrote:
| I still think of https://xkcd.com/325/ often (bobcat) as
| especially when dealing with companies/individuals.
|
| You could outright scam one in twenty and be 95%
| perfect/good.
| JohnnyD10 wrote:
| There's another red flag I've seen: buyers ask to pre-pay on
| the spot without having seen the item. They usually want to use
| Zelle or Venmo, and say they're going to have a relative come
| pickup the item.
| jayrobin wrote:
| Happened to me the other day. I got a weird feeling when they
| responded with a long message within seconds of me messaging
| (maybe it's partially automated?), then when they wanted to
| pay upfront with Zelle and asked for my email I knew it was a
| scam.
|
| At that point they'd send you a fake Zelle/Venmo phishing
| email, saying you need to upgrade to a business account, or
| "login" and do something else to accept the payment.
| Symbiote wrote:
| It's helpful being outside the USA. Many scammers are
| easier to spot.
|
| Profile pictures are obviously American, and often show
| more breast than face.
|
| Instant replies.
|
| Quickly ask for an unusual payment method which no local
| would use.
|
| Write in the local language (machine translated) and don't
| switch to English if I write in English.
| dawnerd wrote:
| I had an eBay sell once for an expensive camera and the buyer
| asked if I could change into pickup and have a relative pick
| it up. Was suuuuuuuper sus but because it was local and paid
| through eBay I figured sure let's see where it goes. Went
| totally fine. Had the person sign a an invoice not that it
| would do anything on the eBay front.
|
| Scammers know it's hard to judge sometimes. Heck there's
| always the risk someone just comes and runs off without
| paying.
|
| Now on marketplace I say cash only in person in public and
| when the person shows up then I offer Zelle or cash whatever.
| That seems to have stopped most of the automatic scam
| attempts.
| burningChrome wrote:
| The Zelle thing is a huge red flag for me.
|
| I almost got scammed by a couple on Facebook Marketplace.
| They had a Mac Mini they were selling for about $20 less than
| the going rate I had found on ebay so I initiated contact and
| we agreed on the price. I asked how they do payment, Paypal,
| Venmo, Stripe?
|
| None of the above. The husband kept telling me sob stories
| about why they don't use any of them - only Zelle. I was
| like, I don't have that, and I'm not setting up another
| payment app just for one purchase.
|
| That's when the scam and the sketchy feelings started
| creeping into my brain. They told me to go get a prepaid
| card, and then send it and they'll ship the Mac Mini when
| they get it. They were a few cities over and just like OP
| said, they didn't want to arrange a pickup. I was like,
| "Yeah, fuck that, you send the PC first and THEN I'll send
| the money." Then the husband told me if they were going to do
| that, I can just scratch off the security label and send then
| the code for safe keeping, and then they'll send the Mac Mini
| when they get the code.
|
| That was the last straw - I told them to fuck off and go scam
| someone else. I got few nasty texts from the husband before
| blocking them.
|
| Scammers use Zelle because nobody else uses it, which then
| forces people to go to great lengths to get something and
| will start to jump through hoops. I was wondering how many
| other people this couple had scammed before I contacted them.
| vajrabum wrote:
| Interesting and disturbing I set up 2 factor with a token in
| Authy for Paypal a few years back and I never click the 'leave me
| logged in' link to prevent anything at all like this.
| masto wrote:
| I like to think I'm pretty scam-savvy, but it only takes a moment
| of the holes in the swiss cheese aligning. I saw a recreation of
| a movie prop that looked like a good gift idea for a friend and
| made an impulse purchase. Something was nagging at the back of my
| head and a couple of minutes later I had a sinking feeling that
| it might be a scam -- sure enough, a little research showed that
| the product photos were stolen, the original was a limited-run
| authorized item that sold for 20x what I paid, and I found a
| forum post where this scam item was being discussed.
|
| The web site I bought from was a single legitimate-looking veneer
| page with most of its content lifted from templates, and there
| was no functional tracking or order management anywhere, so I
| immediately e-mailed them asking to cancel the order, to which
| they replied that they that the product was "good quality", "you
| can rest assured that you have it", and that they would charge me
| a 5% fee to cancel. So I opened a case with PayPal and they
| closed it saying the transaction was "consistent with my purchase
| history", whatever that means. I appealed and they doubled down
| that it was not fraudulent. There are no more buttons to press at
| that point, but I wrote back again reiterating all of the
| evidence that they were actively providing a payment service to
| facilitate fraudulent transactions (the scammer was still around
| and still advertising the same fake products) and after a long
| period of silence I suddenly got a refund.
|
| PayPal is not on your side as a customer, especially if you're
| dealing with a professional scammer who knows how to play the
| game and string things out. I suspect what happened here was that
| they got one too many complaints, and if they'd been a little
| less greedy or more careful, they would have walked away with the
| bag of money.
| Gortal278 wrote:
| It's time to move away from Paypal and use a credit card when
| buying online. Fraud protection with credit cards is much
| stronger. Paypal has proven itself bad for consumers again and
| again.
| EricE wrote:
| It boggles my mind that people still think paypal is
| trustworthy.
| Karellen wrote:
| s/still think/ever thought/
| brianwawok wrote:
| Hey, before Paypal buying on eBay was sending someone a
| money order or a check. It was a million times better /
| more trustworthly / more reliable / faster.
| acdha wrote:
| I don't like PayPal but I am impressed by their ability
| to stay popular. I think the first "don't use this
| company, they'll help scammers screw you" horror story I
| heard was before the turn of the century, and it's not
| like they didn't have competition at any point but they
| managed to get locked into a lot of people's minds as the
| best option.
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| The advantage of PayPal is you don't have to give anyone your
| payment information.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| But you do: you have to give PayPal your payment
| information.
|
| Sure, you don't have to give other people your information,
| but honestly there are few people that I'd want to business
| with that I feel less comfortable giving payment
| information to than PayPal.
| w-ll wrote:
| Was it the Jurassic Park Barbasol Can? I got it as an Instagram
| ad, $30 lesson.
| jolt42 wrote:
| I was thinking if that camera was only $30 I'm not sure I'd
| jump thru the hoops, and so more people would get scammed.
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| I fell for a sob story about a woman who's kid died and left
| behind a PS5 they wanted to get rid of. I was kind and
| sympathetic and said "If you want I can sell it for you and
| forward you the money" they then asked for money to ship it to
| me. (I immediately caught the scam there and blocked them).
| This happened on an open groupme group apparently people can
| enumerate and join them randomly.
|
| in hindsight 1) Don't sell something for someone else-- you
| dont know if it's stolen and 2) Don't front strangers any
| credit/money (I didn't)
| Symbiote wrote:
| In Britain you have the right to cancel an online or mail-order
| purchase up to 14 days after delivery.
|
| This is not new, I think the origin is probably from
| disappointing catalogue ordering.
|
| The business refusing to cancel the order would make an easy
| claim to reverse the payment.
|
| https://www.gov.uk/online-and-distance-selling-for-businesse...
| system2 wrote:
| Since 2020 I stopped buying things used. I do not trust online
| anymore, not even Amazon brand new. If I need something expensive
| I will get it shipped to the store and open it there.
| balderdash wrote:
| Somewhat tangential - but one of my friends used to buy lots of
| concert tickets off Craigslist - but he had one simple rule -
| he'd only buy them unless the seller emailed from a corporate or
| school email account - it was pretty simple and effective - how
| is Facebook marketplace worse than Craigslist
| croemer wrote:
| You probably meant to write "as long as" or "if" not "unless"
| hbn wrote:
| Or
|
| s/'d only/ wouldn't/
| LiquidPolymer wrote:
| I'm curious how Craigslist is bad? I'm a regular user and love
| the functionality of CL. I'm certainly aware of the many
| scammers operating on CL but have found them to be rather easy
| to spot and avoid. Of course, I have a rule - always meet in
| person and test the item. I'm not aware of anybody shipping
| items in CL which is where many of these problems arise.
|
| FWIW - I collect vintage portable music players (minidisc, CD,
| DAT, cassette, 8CM CD) as well as analog music (vinyl,
| cassette, etc). There are so many old guys on CL selling stuff
| they see as useless junk - its an amazing resource. I have a
| rather ridiculous amount of minidisc players and recorders
| purchased for as little as $10 - often in immaculate condition.
|
| eBay is another matter - but I haven't been scammed on that
| platform in many years. I think they are doing something right.
| bluGill wrote:
| Craigslist knows there are are lot of scams and so when you
| go to contact a seller they give a big warning that there are
| scams and so avoid them. Facebook accepts ad from scammers
| but gives you no warning that they do that. And not just
| things that marketplace, but they also accept ads from
| scammers and redirect you do their website for the scam -
| without any warning that it could be a scam.
|
| I refuse to buy from Facebook because they mix things so that
| things that it seems I shouldn't have to beware of could be
| scams. I don't mind buying from a potential scammer - but
| I'll take extra action if I have reason to worry, which in
| turn means if you are not local to me I won't buy from you.
| There are a lot of things that I cannot get locally though,
| so I have to buy from someone who might or might not be
| scamming me, there I look for signs that it is not a scam -
| and there Facebook is not helpful in separating out scams
| from legitimate companies.
| Charlie_26 wrote:
| So for eBay, am I safest using PayPal? Or a Credit card?
| gambiting wrote:
| I don't mean to be funny, but like.....why is Facebook
| Marketplace even allowed to exist at this point? Clearly they do
| literally 0 vetting of anything - I've literally just opened it
| right now, and the first 3 "sponsored listings" are:
|
| 1) Fake UK passports/driving licences
|
| 2) Fake UK banknotes(literally advertised as passing UV tests)
|
| 3) Drugs. Like like literally just magic mushrooms advertised on
| facebook - says various quantities available, contact me on
| Telegram.
|
| At this point I have no idea what would it take for Facebook to
| interviene - actual child porn being sold openly?
| rickreynoldssf wrote:
| I didn't even have to read the article to know how someone got
| scammed on Marketplace. Its nothing and I mean NOTHING but scams
| (oh with the exception of stuff people are giving away).
| xvaier wrote:
| I have bought and sold well over a hundred items on Marketplace
| in the past few years. There are scams, mostly from buyers
| wanting you to ship items to them, but insisting on in-person
| transactions nullifies most of them.
|
| I've even shipped and gotten some items shipped in rare cases
| from people who I could verify the identity.
|
| This is in Canada (Quebec), so I guess mileage may vary.
| mvdtnz wrote:
| I got scammed on a Facebook group (not marketplace). It was a
| surprisingly sophisticated scam but now that I'm aware of it I
| see it constantly in every group that has people posting wanted
| to buy posts.
|
| I was searching for a hard-to-find car part. I asked in the group
| and got a reply saying "try this page" with a link to another
| Facebook page that appeared to be a business a few cities away
| selling car parts. The posts on that page all looked legit, with
| listings for vehicles that make sense for my region, real-looking
| photos of parts laid out and labelled, etc. The posts had
| timestamps that made sense, not just hundreds of posts made on
| one day.
|
| So it seemed trustworthy, I messaged the group and got an
| immediate response (should have been a red flag, response was
| "yes I have that part" within seconds). We negotiated a price
| ($200), he sent through bank details and I transferred the money.
| About an hour later someone else responded to my original post
| with "that's a scam".... sadly, too late.
|
| I dug into the page a bit and found Facebook has a "view post
| history" feature. Every single post on the page had been edited.
| The original posts had all been a rabbit enthusiast posting
| pictures of their rabbits. They had been edited to be pictures of
| car parts with descriptions matching the pictures. Clearly
| someone's credentials had been stolen and their page hijacked.
|
| It's unbelievable to me that Facebook can't detect this kind of
| fraud. Surely someone logging into an account from a new
| location, editing every single post on the page then spamming
| Groups with links to that page should set off automated alarm
| bells. As mentioned, now that I'm aware of this scam I see it in
| every single group that allows "wanted to buy" posts, constantly.
| Like, in every thread.
| emmanuel_1234 wrote:
| The infuriating part is how easy it apparently is to highjack
| dead people / inactive accounts, and use them for fraud.
|
| Case in point, I never use FB except for the marketplace every
| now and then. I naturally forgot my login/password, hit the
| "Forgot password" option, put my phone number and... got given
| access to someone else's account, that they've not used in
| years. They likely had my number before, I guess, passing away.
|
| I contacted FB and did my best to try to lose access to the
| account, starting with login out, but I kept receiving
| notifications through text messages, and was permanently given
| the option to "switch account" with no authentication
| whatsoever. Out of option, I ultimately deactivated the account
| in question, but that pisses me off because I really really did
| not want to alter it in any way.
|
| Long story short, it's not a surprise Facebook is riddled with
| shit like that.
| neilv wrote:
| > _Instead of closing it, I pretended that I couldn't see the
| case on my end and even sent doctored screenshots of the case not
| showing up._
|
| You can handle a potential scammer without behaving like a
| scammer yourself.
|
| You might want to be known as a person who's always honest, not a
| person who tries to decide when it's OK to act dishonestly.
|
| (In this case, it sounds like the writer guessed correctly that
| the other party was a scammer. But no one can always guess
| correctly. And I can imagine even that example situation turning
| out in a way in which the writer would've gotten into significant
| legal trouble.)
| VHRanger wrote:
| Thanks, Immanuel Kant
| neilv wrote:
| For people who have different ideas of what's good practice
| in normal life, maybe a helpful exercise is to imagine that
| example in a business context:
|
| "Bob, uh, did you say you doctored a document from a
| regulated financial institution? And passed it off in a
| representation in a business transaction? It was inter-state
| commerce? And you think the transaction might get disputed,
| and be investigated? ... OK, I think we need to go talk with
| Legal right now."
|
| Of course, just because something is bad in the conventions
| of business, doesn't mean it should be considered bad outside
| of business. But thinking about why it's considered bad in
| one set of conventions could be helpful.
| vvilliamperez wrote:
| I just had a Facebook marketplace camera scam happen to me Today.
|
| Seller marked as shipped, and delivered, but my package wasn't
| there.
|
| After some sleuthing (I knew a guy who works in UPS) the seller
| put a different ship to address. So Facebook marketplace isn't
| doing something as simple as verifying the tracking label is
| heading to the right destination.
|
| Only doing E-bay from here on out. They have this problem solved
| for the most part.
| seattle_spring wrote:
| FB Marketplace should only be used for in-person transactions.
| Think of it more like a craigslist replacement than one for
| eBay.
| fakename wrote:
| I've had the exact same thing happen to me on ebay, FYI.
|
| Bought an A7IV for a very good price. Seller sent a bogus
| tracking number. After it was delivered to not me, I got USPS
| to confirm it didn't match my address and got a refund from
| ebay. It was a pain, and I've learned to never buy from sellers
| without a reasonable history.
|
| It made me very aware to how many times the best price for an
| item is from an account with no feedback. Ebay doesn't seem to
| care about these obvious scams.
| giantg2 wrote:
| That's pretty ballsy to buy anything that needs to be shipped
| from Facebook Marketplace. I wouldn't.
| unglaublich wrote:
| "Thanks PayPal :)"
|
| - Interesting take away after this story.
| mattmaroon wrote:
| I feel like the scammers just had his PayPal creds and this is
| how they extract money from it. If they just transfered it PayPal
| would be more likely to react swiftly to the complaint, this
| method might stymie someone completely.
| ivraatiems wrote:
| A couple of similar, now-common scams I have experienced on
| Facebook Marketplace and eBay:
|
| 1) Buyer messages you, wanting local pickup, but claims they
| can't pick it up themselves and wants to prepay (but won't pay
| through Facebook or an eBay or Mercari link if provided). They
| ask you for your Zelle info. Then they'll tell you your Zelle
| isn't working and needs you to confirm it with them, you'll get a
| confirmation code, give it to them, and they'll have your Zelle
| account.
|
| These scammers' accounts typically look legitimate but are often
| from other cities/countries with no relation to yours. They will
| engage you in complex conversation about arranging pickup but
| typically will disengage and block you if you tell them flatly
| that you do not accept prepayment via Zelle.
|
| 2) On eBay, as a buyer, scammers seem to have access to tracking
| numbers for nearby but not actually the same place. They'll ship
| things to you with an apparently legit tracking number, and when
| it never shows up, blame the shipper.
|
| I have to say that I am not sure how this latter case is making
| money - eBay nearly always sides with the buyer in these kinds of
| disputes.
| emmanuel_1234 wrote:
| I sold a few piece of furniture on Marketplace, and had so many
| occurrences of "My employer is relocating me and I need to
| furnish my new place, I'll send movers to pick up the piece".
| Looking at the seller profile, it's often an account that has
| seen no activity for a while, and the job rarely matches the
| type of position that would get an envelope for relocation
| (e.g.: Amazon warehouse workers surely don't get a package to
| move to a new location).
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2024-02-07 23:01 UTC)