Live data from Hacker News

Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

coryklein.com

141–150 of 243 posts

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I kind of get this. Sounds like Steam accounts. Cheaters galore with family accounts? Rust (game) nailed this by recently deciding to nuke the hen and its eggs.

How did they do that? Hopefully not something like Warden, Blizzard's cheat-detecting rootkit .

Yeah I don't know or care, to be honest. If it keeps those assholes from walling me then I'm okay with it.

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same could be said for eBay. Buyer of my MBP opened a claim against me cause I didn't include the OS install disks (which Apple stopped shipping years earlier). Had to bend over backwards to prevent this con artist from keeping the laptop and money. Now I don't sell shit on eBay.

I recently decided not to sell several expensive bits of electronics on eBay because multiple people warned me about this sort of fraud. Real pity because it's hard to know where to sell that sort of thing these days.

I once sold some parts on eBay from a washing machine I broke up, including the busted motor controller board - this particular model of board was not very sophisticated, but it was difficult to source and very expensive, so I sold it 'for spares or repair', stating that the main triac had blown and taken a track with it, so the board would either need some competent rework, or be stripped for what was still working. The guy whe bought it complained that I had sold a faulty part..and ebay agreed so I had to refund him. I insisted the board was returned 'for inspection' and just binned it. Too much hassle.

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#143
This sort of thing is why I pretty much only sell things like this locally, in-person, and transact in cash. Buyer gets the chance to check out the item, verify the serial number, and so on. I get the guarantee that if they walk out happy it is a done deal.

No one has been able to improve upon this online. Sure, it can be more convenient to sell online, and for people who sell at volume the cost of fraud may be worth it, but for individuals who occasionally sell desirable items that are likely targets of fraud, selling online is too fraught with risk.

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#144

This happened to me about 5 years ago on ebay when selling an iPhone. I was an eBay member since 1999, 100% positive feedback, occasional seller (about once a month). I sold a perfectly fine iPhone, buyer with no feedback history complains to eBay he never received the phone despite tracking showing it was delivered. He also leaves me negative feedback (in broken English). eBay sided with the buyer immediately and at…

After a year they just let it be?

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#145
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently decided not to sell several expensive bits of electronics on eBay because multiple people warned me about this sort of fraud. Real pity because it's hard to know where to sell that sort of thing these days.

What if there was an EBay like action site where you couldn't just sign up, and rather someone had to "vouch" for you? When fraud starts happening, you can see who vouched them in and shut down the network. If people start selling vouches online, then you suspend both them and the person who had the bad judgment to vouch them in originally. (maybe they can keep using the site, but not vouch, etc.) The site would also…

Can't have both sides simultaneously, both a marketplace with too many scammers requiring a complicated solution AND A clean marketplace.

Or phrased another way, its like the gun control problem where the only people following the gun control laws are the non-criminals you have no need to fear, and the people who don't play by the rules are the only source of problems.

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#146

Trusted buyers. Amazon can have options for sellers to only sell to buyers that have bought from Amazon X amount of times or X years.

X dollar value to get past people trading $1 USB cables until they get the big score of 10 iphones or whatever.

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#147
This doesn't make much sense: why would supposedly fraudulent buyers bother with leaving a (public) review with photos of the clay??

This is not only a waste of time and energy but could potentially be harmful to them since it's usually possible to extract clues from a photograph.

Isn't it possible that the story is rather this:

- bad buyer 1 buys a phone, takes the phone out of the case, replaces it with clay, re-seals the box and returns it, claiming he didn't even open it

- seller restocks the package without verifying it

- good buyer 2 buys what they think is an iPhone and turns out to be a box full of clay, is upset and leaves a review

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same could be said for eBay. Buyer of my MBP opened a claim against me cause I didn't include the OS install disks (which Apple stopped shipping years earlier). Had to bend over backwards to prevent this con artist from keeping the laptop and money. Now I don't sell shit on eBay.

You are identifying eBay with Paypal. If you accept, say, only bank transfer, the worst thing that can happen (in "regular" conditions; of course there are exceptional cases) is a negative feedback. I've sold hundreds of items on eBay, almost all payable only via bank transfer/cash, and never had serious problems. If I get a smaller audience, well, that's an acceptable compromise in the long term.

In the UK at least, sellers are required to offer PayPal as a payment option.

Re: Scammers Game Amazon A-Z Policy By Replacing iPhones With Clay

#150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to say this but you basically have to trust these types of authorities when it comes to this type of "trust." You wouldn't believe how many people are out to scam. It's endemic in anything that involves money. I'd say "few bad eggs" but it's mostly shit eggs amongst a few good eggs.

So for those of us who simply don't meet their definition for an identifiable individual (e.g. someone who borrows money and allows their borrowing history to be monitored by commercial and government entities), what, we're just shit out of luck? Credit history being a requirement for identity verification is becoming more and more pervasive, and I am increasingly locked out of participating in both private and gover…

Unprovable people are a liability to Amazon. They're minimizing liability to their business. In their eyes, a broken appeals process might be a benefit. If a would-be customer is enough of an outlier to need a special process, it makes sense to handle them quickly, and less sense to handle them correctly.

In my area, it's almost impossible to even rent an apartment without good credit history, and it's absolutely impossible to rent a non-crappy apartment. Why? Because there are enough people with solid credit histories to fill the buildings, and because of the lower risk, there's no reason not to rely on credit checks.

Post reply on HN