E-Bay Is Broken Buyers & Sellers Beware

Yet another writer and blogger descibing thier selling experinaces on E-Bay it's nice to see that the fruad problem is still around although not with coins this time it's still the clasic ongoing scam. Below for you convenince is a copy of the article.

I expected selling my computer on eBay to be easy.

Attempt 1: I listed it. Within hours, someone bought it -- from a hacked account, as eBay notified me, canceling the sale.

Attempt 2: I listed it again. Within hours, someone bought it, and asked me to send it to her via FedEx overnight. The buyer sent payment via PayPal immediately, and then -- near as I could tell -- immediately opened a dispute with PayPal so that the funds were put on hold. And then she sent me an e-mail saying "I paid you, now send me the computer." But PayPal was faster than she expected, I think. At the same time, I received an e-mail from PayPal saying that I might have received a payment that the account holder did not authorize, and that I shouldn't ship the item until the investigation is complete.

I was willing to make Attempt 3, but someone on my blog bought it first. It looks like eBay is completely broken for items like this.

It's not just me.

http://consumerist.com/5007790/its-now-completely-impossible-to-sell-a-laptop-on-ebay or http://tinyurl.com/55hprp

A copy of this essay, with all embedded links, is here:

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/06/fraud_on_ebay.html

Area 419 Sorry the Number You Have Dialed is Not In Service Please Try Again (An Old Scam) Part Two

Since it's Friday and the weekend is upon us I thought I would end off the week with a laugh. Here is another one of those 419 scams, as I get them I will post them here so people can see them and have an idea of what they are like. I'm still surprised that people fall for these things. I really Liked " The armed Rubbers" part in the response it's great for a chuckle or two.

From Miss Blessing Soke
Bp ave 6 Abidjan Cote d'Ivoire
Email :blessingsoke1@yahoo.fr

Pls do response via this email address : blessingsoke1@yahoo.fr

Dear one,

It is my pleasure to contact you for a business venture which I intend to establish in your country for our mutual benefits hence I write with due respect .

I am Blessing Soke and I inherited an important sum of money from my late father who was killed by the rebels in northern part of the country in a recent crisis in Cote d'Ivoire in 2004. I wish to request for your assistance in transfering and investing this money in a lucrative venture under your directives and guidiance in your country.

I want you to assist me for the transfer of this sum of Three million, five hundred thousand United State Dollars.($3.500,000)to your account designate hence I will give you the contact of the bank where the money is so that you can contact them immediately and discuss with them since I do not know much about financial issues.

I will give you some resonable percentage from the total sum for your assistance while I pray that you do not betray me at last. Please it is important you contact me immediately for more clarifications on the next step hence it is my wish to relocate to your country as soon as this transaction is concluded.
Awaiting your immediate response via this email address : blessingsoke1@yahoo.fr
God bless you.

Miss Blessing Soke .

My Reply

Hello Blessing Soke,

I would like to be of service please forward to me the details on how
I might be able to assist you. Keep in Mind I know this is a con job I'm fishing to see what the response will be.

Here is the response

My Dear,

Thanks a lot for your mail, This is a long story that tears don't allow me explain to you out my condition and what i have been passing through here since the death of my father. Infact it is by the grace of God i contact you, i prayed and ask God to do his wish if you will be my messiah in this my agony. I know this may come to you as a surprise but
please, i want you to find it in your heart to help me out of the agony am facing here, I am hiding in a guest house now because of my uncle who would have been my father, but turn to hunt for my life because of the only thing i inherited from my father.

Like i told you that before the death of my father , he advise me to seek for a reliable partner who will help me transfer this money and invest it wisely,since his death, his junior brother has claim everything and even the cars my father left, that is not my problem but he turns to hunt for my life because of the onlything i inherited, that is why i ran away to the church but still he wanted to kill me that he even sent some armed rubbers to harm the Rev Father, the Rev father has to advise me to go and secure a hiding place in one of the guest house, that is where i find my self in agony, even feeding here is difficult to me,

Please i have consulted the bank here about the deposit and informed them that i want to transfer the money abroad and they said that they will hear from my partner before they commence the transfer, Please for God sake, i want you to stand as my guardian towards the deposit so that the bank will release into your account and you kindly help me come
over to your country and start a new life, I have with me here the documents about the deposit and i can send it to you please help me out, i need your urgent assistance.

Please what i need from you now is to indicate your interest towards contacting the bank on my behalf so that they will transfer the money to your account.please do send your picture to me for more details and also give me your tel number so that i will call you. this is my number where you can reach me +22508747657

I will be expecting your kind mail please urgent and always remember me in prayer as am facing agony here and even feeding is very difficult to me and all my hope relies on the deposit. God bless and give you the strenght to help me out.
Thanks for your concern and may God continue to bless you .
Regard from
Blessing.

Area 419 Sorry the Number You Have Dialed is Not In Service Please Try Again (An Old Scam)

Well this is funny, it's a new twist on the old 419 scams, this one though was traced to Venezuela.

I'm amazed that these still work, though I can only assume they do as they keep making the rounds so there must be a payoff of some sort. Below you will find the trace results along with the scam mail. Please feel free to leave any comments or feedback.

1 319 ms 6 ms 6 ms 10.45.28.1 2 * * *
Request timed out. 3 7 ms 6 ms 5 ms gw03.etob.phub.net.cable.rogers.com

[66.185.93.161] 4 6 ms 7 ms 8 ms gw02-pos1-0.wlfdle.phub.net.cable.rogers.com

[66.185.82.97] 5 7 ms 7 ms 7 ms 66.185.80.42 6 138 ms 7 ms 7 ms

64.71.240.110 7 22 ms 33 ms 23 ms pos-2-0.igw01.ny8th.phub.net.cable.rogers.com

[66.185.81.102] 8 185 ms 60 ms 26 ms GE3-0-1-0-grtnycpt3.red.telefonica-wholesale.net
[213.140.52.201] 9 25 ms 27 ms 56 ms
So2-3-0-0-grtmiana2.red.telefonica-wholesale.net [213.140.36.114]
10 55 ms 86 ms 85 ms CANTV-5-0-0-0-grtmiana2.red.telefonica-wholesale.net [84.16.8.14]
11 601 ms 547 ms 701 ms CANTV-5-0-0-0-grtmiana2.red.telefonica-wholesale.net [84.16.8.14]
12 709 ms 192 ms 378 ms cha-ge-10-0-0-00.dist.cantv.net
[200.44.43.199]
13 * * 93 ms 200-11-184-130.genericrev.cantv.net [200.11.184.130]

14 101 ms * * correo.universia.edu.ve [200.11.183.3]
15 92 ms 104 ms 108 ms correo.universia.edu.ve [200.11.183.3]

Trace complete.

X-YahooFilteredBulk: 200.11.183.3
X-Originating-IP: [200.11.183.3]
Return-Path:
Authentication-Results: mta337.mail.re4.yahoo.com from=universia.edu.ve; domainkeys=neutral (no sig)
Received: from 200.11.183.3 (EHLO soluniver02.universia.edu.ve) (200.11.183.3) by mta337.mail.re4.yahoo.com with SMTP; Wed, 28 Mar 2007 04:50:40 -0700
Received: from universia.edu.ve (soluniver02.universia.edu.ve [200.11.183.3]) by soluniver02.universia.edu.ve (iPlanet Messaging Server 5.1 Patch 1 (built Jun 6 2002)) with ESMTP id <0jfl00cc4s48si@soluniver02.universia.edu.ve>; Wed, 28 Mar 2007 03:43:24 -0400 (VET)
Received: from [80.255.40.250] by soluniver02.universia.edu.ve (mshttpd); Tue, 27 Mar 2007 23:43:20 -0800
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2007 23:43:20 -0800
From: jjudge@universia.edu.ve Add to Address Book Add Mobile Alert
Subject: ENQUIRY
Bcc:
Reply-to: jjudge10@sify.com
Message-id: <449a6ed1.6ed1449a@universia.edu.ve>
MIME-version: 1.0
X-Mailer: iPlanet Messenger Express 5.1 Patch 1 (built Jun 6 2002)
Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-language: en
Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT
Content-disposition: inline
X-Accept-Language: en
Content-Length: 5207

Good day,

I am John Judge, a staff of ADAM & COMPANY I am contacting you
independently of my investigation and no one is informed of
this communication. I would like to intimate you with certain
facts that I believed would be of interest to you.I Would
respectfully request that you keep the contents of this mail
confidential and respect the integrity of the information you
come by as a result of this mail.


I am contacting you in respect of $10.5 Million USD deposited
with our private bank whose original depositor died in mid
2002,According to practice, The bank will by the end of its
financial year broadcast a request for statements of
claims,failing to receive viable claims they will probably
revert the deposit back to ADAM & COMPANY.This will result in
the money entering the ADAM & COMPANY accounting system,This
will not happen if I have my way, the world of private banking
especially is fraught with huge rewards for those who occupy
certain offices and oversee certain portfolios.As a matter of
fact,In line with our internal processes for account holders
who have passed away,we instituted our own investigations in
good fate to determine who should have right to claim the
estate. This investigation has for the past years been
unfruitful. We have scanned every continent and used our
private investigation affiliate companies to get to the root
of the problem. It is this investigation that resulted in my
being furnished with your details as a possible relative of
the deceased.


My present official capacity as the Head of private banking
sector dictates that I am the only party to supervise the
investigation and the only party to receive the results of the
investigation,leaves me as the only person with the full
picture of what the prevailing situation is in relation to the
deposit and the beneficiary of the deposit.


My proposal:I am prepared to place you in a position to
initiate the release of the deposit to you as the closest
surviving relation,Upon successful delivery of the deposit to
you,I am prepared to share the money with you. That is: I will
simply norminate you as the next of kin and have them release
the deposit to you. We share the proceeds 50/50 %.The
alternative would be for us to have The bank ADAM & COMPANY
direct the funds to another bank with you as account holder.
This way there will be no need for you to think of receiving
the money from The bank. We can fine-tune this based on our
interactions am aware of the consequences of this proposal. I
ask that if you find no interest in this project that you
should discard this mail. I ask that you do not be vindictive
and destructive. If my offer is of no appeal to you, delete
this message and forget I ever contacted you.


My present official capacity as the Head of private banking
sector I assure you that I could have the deposit released to
you within few days. I shall validate the claim, make a
customary writing report that you are the Beneficiary.This
report will validate the bonafide of your claim and confirm
you as the beneficiary and therefore entitled to an allocation
of Control Approval code for the release of the deposit by the
bank .once i validate the claim, the bank is bound to approve
same, this is why i have an unflinching confidence in the
safety of our arrangement.The transaction will be 100% legal.
From the foregoing, you are therefore able to appreciate why i
have hammered on the absolute necessity of our maintenance of
confidentiality of the project and the transfer even after we
have disbursed the money after arrival in your position.


I am not a criminal and what I do, I do not find against good
conscience,this may be hard for you to understand, but the
dynamics of my industry dictates that I make this move. Such
opportunities only come ones' way once in a lifetime. I cannot
let this chance pass me by,I am a family man and this is an
opportunity to provide them with new opportunities.There is a
reward for this project and it is a task well worth
undertaking. I have evaluated the risk and the only risk I
have here is from you refusing to work with me and alerting my
bank. I am the only one who knows of this situation,If you
find yourself able to work with me, contact me through this
email account. If you give me positive signals, I will
initiate this process towards a conclusion. I wish to inform
you that should you contact me via official channels; I will
deny knowing you and about this project.


I repeat, I do not want you contacting me through my official
phone lines nor do I want you contacting me through my
official email account. Contact me only through the numbers I
will provide for you and also through this email address. I do
not want any direct link between you and myself. My official
lines are not secured lines as they are periodically monitored
to access our level of customer care in line with our Total
Quality Management Policy.Please observe this instruction
religiously.

Awaiting your immediate response.

Thanks for your co-operation.

Please to my private email address jjudge10@sify.com

yours faithfully,
John Judge