Scammer trying to scam our site users

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Posted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 12:10 am

Hello, glad to be a part of this forum. My name is Mike, I am the owner/site admin of Wheels For Sale By Owner. We are a privately owned/operated auto classifieds website trying to make a go of it online. We have hundreds of legit registered users nationwide on our website trying to sell their vehicles. The problem is that there are scammers on the site trying to scam the sellers. How do we get rid of them?
Here is the email of one:

Date: Fri, 7 Dec 2007 11:09:52 -0800
From: "barristerwilliams fultons" <[email protected]>
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To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: 1954 Chevrolet 3800 Pickup

hello mr Rodney XXXX
how are you today, and all your family, i really think that all is well, with you and your family, please i am very very sorry for not really and kindly getting back to you for a while ok, pls kindly spare and forgive me for that ok, the problem of my abseenteism online, is that i am outside the
country ok, please i really went for an enormous and huge case in the
supreme court of law, as at in the city of birmingham of united kingdom ( u.k) ok, as you really know that i am a famous legal practitioner, please thats is the reasons why i have been so much very busy, and not been online for a while ok. please mr Rodney XXXX, i will really like to kindly inform you that, i really have a discussion and a chart with my, ups delivery service manager and also have a chart with my bank accountant as at this week monday ok, and he really and kindly inform me that, the check have been sent and also delivered as at recently to the destination of the address giving to him as at this week wednesday ok, as at last two days ago. and he kindly and really send me the tracking number, as at yesterday on (thursday), and i really hope and really think that the check would have really ought, to have surely reach your destination as at latest, by today as at (friday) morning ok, pls i am kindly and really waiting and expecting you to kindly and realy get back to me here ok, as at soonest ok, on the transactions issue and payment conditions and effect ok, pls i am kindly here waiting and expecting your happily and plesaeful reply ok, concerning the check. and kindly mind you that i have recently contact my bank accountant also, and he really gave me a confirmation and evidence, that some amount of money, have been deducted, withdraw, from my bank account, concerning the check that he really sent, forward to you ok, please i am really here right now seeking and pleading from you ok, to please kindly and favourably get back to me here, as soon as possible, or instantly, just mainly because i dont really know what is going on here, and happen here, i am totally and absolutely confused about this ok, and also as at what is really affecting and delaying the transaction anymore, just mainly because i am here very much worried, scared, amazed and fed up ok, just mainly because i really ought to have kindly and really be looking forward, for the truck to really get, to my destination as latest by next week tuesday or wednesday ok, but why,
please kindly and favourably try as much as possible to really and kindly bear and comply with me ok, please i will be here to really hear from you the effect and delayed of the truck ok, i will surely and willing be expecting to hear from you soonest, i am here kindly and really waiting and expecting your happily and pleaseful reply ok,
please kindly get back to me urgently, please your attention is urgently needed ok.
please get back to me soonest ok.

thanks you alot.
best regards.
from barrister williams fultons.

Baiting Guru Joined: 08 Jul 2004 Posts: 11857 Location: UK

Hi wheelsfsbodotcom and welcome to the eater.

Quote:

How do we get rid of them?

Simple answer is, you can't, most sites like yours (depending on size and popularity) have dozens to hundreds of fake check scammers who operate on them, the bigger and more popular you are, the more scammers, is how it usually works, www.craigslist.org is a good example, you can place a fake advert on there to bait scammers, and within a couple of days, you might have a couple of dozen scammers emailing you, wanting to buy your item, of course, payment will be by fake check.

They mostly go for the overpayment scam, say a car is advertised for $5000, they send the seller a check for $8000, asking the seller to send the $3000 difference to their shipper so they can collect the car, the way banking works, banks have to make deposited funds available to customers "before" the funds have cleared, but a hell of a lot of people don't realise that, they see the $8000 on their bank balance, assume the check is ok, so they send the $3000 to the scammer via Western Union, a little while later, the bank informs the customer that the check was fake, leaving the victim out of pocket, facing having their account frozen, facing possible arrest for fraud, and possible jail time, as has happened to some victims.

All you can really do is put a lot of anti scam notices on your site, take a look at the Craigslist site for example, if you place an advert on that site, when someone replies to you through the site craigslist email address relating to your advert, you get a big scam warning all over the email, something like that might help on your site to raise awareness.

Go and place an advert on craigslist yourself, then reply to your advert to see what the email says about scams etc, it might give you some ideas to implement, rather than people being able to put their own email address and contact details on site, is that how you have it set up now when people click on the Contact This Seller link on your site?

The email you posted above is clearly written by an African scammer, it uses all the typical wordings they tend to use, most fake check scammers are from West Africa, so, if the people selling cars on your site are solely from the US, you could get all the major African IP ranges and block them all from viewing your site completely, I know, it's drastic, but that would knock most of them out, apart from the US, Canadian, and Europena based scammers, but nowhere near as many as based in Africa, and there would be no problems for legitimate users if it's solely a US site for US sellers.

Posted: Tue Dec 18, 2007 3:00 pm

I took a look at some for sale pages and your setup is like blood in the water to sharks for these scammers. You have folks listing name, address, phone numbers, email address... OMG!!!!! Talk about throwing yourself to the wolves. You need a complete site redo with anonomous email distributing ala craigslist. Get that personal info off your site FAST before someone gets hurt.

LW

Posted: Wed Dec 19, 2007 2:21 am

As SP said, you can't get rid of them. But you can post warnings to your members. Also point them here if you like. With about 100 years of experience at this site, we can pick out the scams fairly easily. Really the main rule is; if it sounds too good to be true, it is a scam. And any one wanting money sent back is a scammer.

Posted: Thu Dec 20, 2007 6:38 am

I'm pretty busy right now, but I will make some time to see if I can't become a thorn in the good barristers side.

Posted: Thu Dec 20, 2007 11:00 pm

Just checked my email, he did it again today two times..... to the same person. I am about ready to run a full blown scam on him!

How exactly does one go about banning I.P. addresses from certain countries? I would like to know how to ban everyone except the US & Canada!
Can anyone give me a step by step? Please help!

I know there are scammers in the US & Canada also, but is it just me or does it seem like all the others make up the majority of the "scamming" community?

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