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How I got scammed on Facebook Marketplace (2023)
- RajT88 3y agoWow, for once a PayPal story where someone didn't get screwed.
- janus24 3y ago> 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 3y agoI 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 3y agoThey provide a possible reason, that being mobile number spoofing and calling the call center
- gertlex 3y agoThis might be an option you turned on? I don't experience 2FA for paypal... But I'll probably go fix that today.
- TonyTrapp 3y agoI'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 3y agoIt 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 3y agoAgreed on the yikes here - this should be a high priority issue from paypal's side to address. This seems like a HUGE loophole
- ellisv 3y agoEh, I'm sure PayPal could see how it happened but the relatively low level support person wouldn't have access to such information.
- purpleflame1257 3y agoWhen I do FB marketplace I go cash and in-person. It lets you assess the quality of whatever you're buying.
- Sohcahtoa82 3y agoThis 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 3y agoI'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 3y agoI 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 3y agoI 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.
- javajosh 3y agoInteresting 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 3y agoThe 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 3y agoIn 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 3y agoWell 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
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- edent 3y agoThere'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!
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- yieldcrv 3y agoThere 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 3y ago>There have been routine escrow mechanisms on bitcoin for 10 years? Its a very lucrative side business to operate those? Are those questions?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- latchkey 3y agoIs it possible that the scammer works for paypal or has someone on the inside with access to open and close tickets?
- rssoconnor 3y ago> (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 3y agoCame 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 3y ago> 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 3y agoBingo. 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 3y agoBelieve 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 3y agoIf 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.
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- personjerry 3y agoThe title should be "How PayPal refunded me for a scam" no?
- behnamoh 3y agoHow the heck such a FB account is not banned yet? The author said it was created in 2017.
- zaltekk 3y agoI wonder if the scammer is using emails and passwords from a breach against Facebook to access "reputable" accounts and then posting marketplace listings.
- emayljames 3y agoFB 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.
- ochronus 3y agoWhen I was still using facebook ages ago, I repeatedly reported trivially fake accounts. Every single time they concluded the accounts are fine.
- robinsonb5 3y agoIt hasn't improved - I still do it from time to time, with the same results.
- stavros 3y agoI got scammed for £60 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 3y agoFake 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 3y agoI 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.
- notso411 3y ago[dead]
- beauzero 3y agoThere 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 3y agoMaybe one of those sites that come up when you search Google for 'track package' is selling tracking numbers?
- bluSCALE4 3y agoThis 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 3y agoHow 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 3y agoThey may have a person on the inside. Whats disturbing is Paypal didnt investigate the issue at all.
- JohnnyD10 3y agoIn 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.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- geor9e 3y agoI'm assuming paypal customer service just needs name, address, and phone number to fully authenticate a caller and perform all actions.
- bhouston 3y agoBeen 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 3y agoInteresting. 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 3y agoI still think of https://xkcd.com/325/ 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.
- cutemonster 3y agoOr scam only when selling something expensive
- JohnnyD10 3y agoThere'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.
- vajrabum 3y agoInteresting 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 3y agoI 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.
- system2 3y agoSince 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 3y agoSomewhat 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 3y agoYou probably meant to write "as long as" or "if" not "unless"
- hbn 3y agoOr s/'d only/ wouldn't/
- LiquidPolymer 3y agoI'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 3y agoCraigslist 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 3y agoSo for eBay, am I safest using PayPal? Or a Credit card?
- emayljames 3y agoI'd very much say Credit Card as you are insured for the purchase
- gambiting 3y agoI 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?
- emayljames 3y agoYeah omg, I have seen those. TBH I don't know if it is undercover cops or just really the absolute wild west that is FB.
- rickreynoldssf 3y agoI 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 3y agoI 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 (Québec), so I guess mileage may vary.
- mvdtnz 3y agoI 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 3y agoThe 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 3y ago> 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 3y agoThanks, Immanuel Kant
- neilv 3y agoFor 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 3y agoI 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 3y agoFB Marketplace should only be used for in-person transactions. Think of it more like a craigslist replacement than one for eBay.
- fakename 3y agoI'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 3y agoThat's pretty ballsy to buy anything that needs to be shipped from Facebook Marketplace. I wouldn't.
- unglaublich 3y ago"Thanks PayPal :)" - Interesting take away after this story.
- mattmaroon 3y agoI 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 3y agoA 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 3y agoI 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).
- retrocryptid 3y agoThis whole post sounds scammy. There's no way to "call" PayPal. If the author would have said "spent two hours in a fruitless attempt to find a phone number on PayPal's web site," then I might have believed them. But I can't figure out what the scam is here. Why make up a story like this? Maybe it's some weird way to train a 3rd party LLM? It finds some text on the internet and just includes it into its training set. Months later it barfs out sentences about "calling" PayPal? Seems like a lot of work.
- SebFender 3y agoBuying anything on Marketplace without seeing & trying the product is an absolute mistake. And then expecting PayPal does the right thing? Can't believe people still do this
- Elizabeth0147 3y ago[dead]
- CHERISH9900 3y agoOne has to be wary of fake investment companies online these days. I was a victim of an investment scam. I lost $70K to a scam broker. However, I was able to recover all my funds with the help of this Contact (wisetechhack@ gmail .com)
- Saris 3y agoThe crazy part is how they managed to open/close Paypal cases for the buyer, it sounds like Paypal has some kind of bug or just lax security over the phone in verifying who someone is.