Scammers hitting a majority of iPhones on eBay? (UPDATE 1)

On a cursory survey, it looks like perhaps that more than 50% of 8GB iPhone auctions are eventually canceled by eBay security due to fraudulent buyers with hijacked accounts.

Try this: Go to eBay and open up say 20 different 8GB iPhone auctions with bids that are about to end soon in different browser tabs. You can check the ending prices in an hour or whatever by refreshing each tab. Then leave the browser tabs open. Check back in 24 hours, refreshing each tab again, and most of the auctions that ended over $750 will be canceled by eBay security, which apparently has over 2000 investigators currently on the lookout for iPhone fraud. When I checked early morning July 3rd, about 70% had been canceled in my (quasi) random sample. Results may vary on auction close time depending on the time zones the scammers are from.

Closing prices for legitimate auctions may inch higher as availability at Apple Stores becomes more scarce, but the scammers (with hijacked eBay accounts) may not tire, because once they win the auction, they receive the seller’s direct email address. Even if the auction is canceled by eBay security, they may try to get the seller to ship anyways through phishing.

See my own experience with a hijacked buyer in “eBay iPhone Fraud: Sellers Beware: Update 3 below). This scam attempted to convince me in dead earnest to ship the item to a specific address in Nigeria.

UPDATE 1:
Looks like eBay security is finally making a dent in the iPhone scammers. I tried another survey today for auctions for 8gig units ending later afternoon today (July 3) Pacific time. Out of about 15 auctions, only 1 ended suspiciously high, over $800. Yesterday a full two thirds in my small sample ended over $800, and were subsequently canceled.

UPDATE 2:
24 hours later on July 4, all auction ID numbers in my new sample were still valid, none canceled by eBay security. Looks like these past 36 hours, it’s been getting more probable that legitimate buyers and sellers would hook up with each other. Good job to eBay; I’m sure they dealt with a similar process with the PS3 and Wii.

This entry was posted on July 3, 2007 at 9:15 am and is filed under iPhone. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.