How I got scammed on Facebook Marketplace (2023)

I fell for a sob story about a woman who's kid died and left behind a PS5 they wanted to get rid of. I was kind and sympathetic and said "If you want I can sell it for you and forward you the money" they then asked for money to ship it to me. (I immediately caught the scam there and blocked them). This happened on an open groupme group apparently people can enumerate and join them randomly.

in hindsight 1) Don't sell something for someone else-- you dont know if it's stolen and 2) Don't front strangers any credit/money (I didn't)

I 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?

I 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).

I 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.

I 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.