When I address groups about the scams of the Internet the first thing I
tell them is to not click on links that want your money, could want your
money etc... Emails can be made to look very convincing. Best practice
is to ALWAYS go to the merchants home page by manually entering it into
your browser. Do NOT click on the merchants banner or link with in the
email as it will take you to their site which is designed to look like
your bank, eBay etc..... By doing this you can verify the transaction and
or communication.
These scams work as you can see which is why they get sent out.
I nearly got scammed out of $2000 this week in a e-bay transaction that I
> didn't figure out until the scammer asked for a MoneyGram. E-bay reported
> this morning that the scam came from an "unauthorized account take-over" =
> hack. This is doubly dangerous, as the initial correspondence was
> "official", including my e-bay ID and all graphics and formatting (with
> instructions not to send a MoneyGram).
>
> The auction closed without meeting the seller's reserve. I then got a
> Second Chance notice saying the seller had reduced his Buy-it-now price to
> $2000 - a bargain "too good to be true". This notice included my e-bay ID
> and in all respects looked official - same pictures, same text, logo,
> everything. Somewhere around then I also got another copy in which my
> e-bay ID was replaced with "buyer". I might have noticed the logo at that
> time, as Vista usually blocks them. But I did not, so I accepted. Then I
> got a direct message from the scammer, bypassing e-bay. We had several
> back and forths, before he asked for a MoneyGram.
>
> I had one real response from the seller that included his name. So I
> found him on WhitePages.com and called. He had been getting all manner of
> messages about cars that were not his, and two hours before had contacted
> e-bay, erased his account, and established a new ID.
>
> So, the lesson is that you may not be able to recognize a scam until they
> ask for a direct payment of some kind outside of e-bay and PayPal.
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