Last week I was contacted by ebay after someone took over my account. I’m not quite sure how it happened, but they managed to access both my ebay account and my email. The person who took over my ebay account apparently listed dozens of laptops (some nice powerbooks even!) for sale. Much to their credit, ebay realised what was happening and shut down the auctions but, based on the emails I’ve been getting from other ebay users, a few people had already fell victim to this scam. The following is from an ebay user who says he paid for 10 laptops with a Western Union transfer and has yet to receive them:
THIS GUY HAD LAPTOPS ON EBAY FOR SALE HE HAS RECEIVED GOOD AMOUNT OF MY MONEY. WHO I AM I SUPPOSE TO CONTRACT TO RECEIVE MY ITEMS THAT HAS BEEN PAID FOR IN FULL. HE WANTED WESTERN UNION ONLY HE MADE CONTACT WITH ME OVER THE PHONE AND YAHOO. THERE TEN WERE LAPTOPS PAID FOR IN FULL.PLEASE HELP ANY WAY POSSIBLE TO RECEIVE MY ITEMS OR MY MONEY BACK. HE USE THE NAME XXXXXXXXX. IN MILANO, ITALY. I HAVE MY WESTERN UNION PAPERS WERE THE MONEY TRANSFER WAS MADE.I HAVE COPIES OF THE MESSAGES FROM YAHOO. PLEASE HELP I AM PRAYING HE HAS NOT DONE THIS TO ANYONE ELSE. I HAVE CALLED HIS COMPUTER LEFT MESSAGES ON HIS YAHOO I HAVE NOT RECEIVED ANYTHING.
So a note to all ebay users – don’t send someone cash or money via Western Union. More tips in ebay’s safety centre .
Update: Apparently the problem I had is increasingly widespread.
Oy – this happened to me in reverse at my last company. We were selling a powerbook we had used for one project, and sold it to someone we thought was local. They paid us, we got the money, gave them the laptop. Turns out they had hacked someone else’s account complete with lots of paypal money linked to it – and we lost out on our money and our laptop.