THIS IS A LONG READ, BUT IT COULD SAVE YOU $$$$$ AND EMBARRASSMENT!
I don't "do" Facebook or other forms of social media like Tik Tok, so I can't comment much on them, but I know a LOT about scammers on internet forums. Here are some tips and things learned over the years.
Scammers love WTB ads because the buyer is already prepared to send payment to get the item they are looking for. As a buyer, look out for and do the following things to protect yourself as much as possible:
1) Everyone is a newbie sometime, but be very wary of new members offering to sell you an item you are looking for. Ask for pictures of the specific item with the seller's license in the picture or, at the very least, a piece of paper in the photo with the current date written on it. When you receive the photos, do a search on them with Google or Tinyeye (or both) to see if they were stolen from another site. Also look for signs of the picture being photoshopped. Sometimes it is easy to see, other times, not so much so. If you see signs the picture was altered, RUN!
2) Get as much info as possible on the seller. A legitimate seller won't mind giving you their address and phone number. Then check the info out on line.
3) Never send cash or pay with a form of electronic payment that offers no recourse/refund for deals gone bad. This sounds stupidly obvious but people do it all the time! If a seller insists on using this form of payment, they are a scammer! If they tell you their PayPal account was hacked or closed because of some BS reason, they are a scammer! This holds true for websites as well. Several sites have popped up offering various items at amazing prices. When it comes time to check out, they require payment made via Zelle, Venmo or BitCoin. THEY ARE SCAMS!!!!
4) Long time forum membership is usually a good indicator of stability BUT.... we have seen scammers taking over member's accounts on forums and scamming people. How they do this is stupid simple: every few weeks, we hear about some company data base being hacked. Scammers buy this info on the dark web, then take the password and try it on different websites BECAUSE PEOPLE USE THE SAME PASSWORD OVER AND OVER! If a long time member answers your WTB ad, use the same precautions, and check their forum activities. If they have been inactive for a long time and are suddenly offering to sell you an item, there's a very good chance they are not who they claim to be!
5) Pay attention to the verbiage used in any communications. If a person claims to be from your country, their speech and written communication should reflect that. If they are using unusual words or grammatically incorrect sentences, you are probably dealing with a Nigerian Prince. Beware!
6) A very common communication from scammers will be a rendition of these phrases:
"My father-in-law has what you are looking for. You should contact him at (123) 456-7890" or
"You should contact Bonnie Deadbeat at we.are.scammers.gmail.com Her husband just died and she is selling his things." or
"Call John at (098) 765-4321 I have bought from him before and he is great to deal with."
There are hundreds modifications on these but they are all the same and all scams. Many are even creative enough to include naming the specific item you are looking for.
7) If it sounds too good, it most likely is. If someone offers you a $1,000 item for $500, assume they are trying to scam you and double down on all the precautions listed above.
Scammers have proliferated because quite frankly, there is no law enforcement. In the vast majority of cases, the scammer is not in your country, so you will be dealing with a foreign county, who unfortunately won't give two dead flies about your misfortune. Two of the biggest scam operations are located in India. They are the source of all the "Your Norton is expiring", "This PayPal Invoice is for the $756 Bit Coins you purchased", "The phone call from Amazon about the Ipad you just ordered" and similar scams. You can even find out who owns these centers via Google and get an idea of the millions of dollars they estimated to be taking in each year. Both the local India law enforcement and national police refuse to do anything about it. Corruption at it's finest!
In the end, the only person who can keep you from being scammed is YOU! Scammers play percentages and prey upon people's ignorance and/or good nature. If they send out 1,000 messages (we often find one scammer contacting more than a dozen people at once on our site) and only 1% bite, that's 10 people they are going to scam. Don't be in that 1%.
I don't "do" Facebook or other forms of social media like Tik Tok, so I can't comment much on them, but I know a LOT about scammers on internet forums. Here are some tips and things learned over the years.
Scammers love WTB ads because the buyer is already prepared to send payment to get the item they are looking for. As a buyer, look out for and do the following things to protect yourself as much as possible:
1) Everyone is a newbie sometime, but be very wary of new members offering to sell you an item you are looking for. Ask for pictures of the specific item with the seller's license in the picture or, at the very least, a piece of paper in the photo with the current date written on it. When you receive the photos, do a search on them with Google or Tinyeye (or both) to see if they were stolen from another site. Also look for signs of the picture being photoshopped. Sometimes it is easy to see, other times, not so much so. If you see signs the picture was altered, RUN!
2) Get as much info as possible on the seller. A legitimate seller won't mind giving you their address and phone number. Then check the info out on line.
3) Never send cash or pay with a form of electronic payment that offers no recourse/refund for deals gone bad. This sounds stupidly obvious but people do it all the time! If a seller insists on using this form of payment, they are a scammer! If they tell you their PayPal account was hacked or closed because of some BS reason, they are a scammer! This holds true for websites as well. Several sites have popped up offering various items at amazing prices. When it comes time to check out, they require payment made via Zelle, Venmo or BitCoin. THEY ARE SCAMS!!!!
4) Long time forum membership is usually a good indicator of stability BUT.... we have seen scammers taking over member's accounts on forums and scamming people. How they do this is stupid simple: every few weeks, we hear about some company data base being hacked. Scammers buy this info on the dark web, then take the password and try it on different websites BECAUSE PEOPLE USE THE SAME PASSWORD OVER AND OVER! If a long time member answers your WTB ad, use the same precautions, and check their forum activities. If they have been inactive for a long time and are suddenly offering to sell you an item, there's a very good chance they are not who they claim to be!
5) Pay attention to the verbiage used in any communications. If a person claims to be from your country, their speech and written communication should reflect that. If they are using unusual words or grammatically incorrect sentences, you are probably dealing with a Nigerian Prince. Beware!
6) A very common communication from scammers will be a rendition of these phrases:
"My father-in-law has what you are looking for. You should contact him at (123) 456-7890" or
"You should contact Bonnie Deadbeat at we.are.scammers.gmail.com Her husband just died and she is selling his things." or
"Call John at (098) 765-4321 I have bought from him before and he is great to deal with."
There are hundreds modifications on these but they are all the same and all scams. Many are even creative enough to include naming the specific item you are looking for.
7) If it sounds too good, it most likely is. If someone offers you a $1,000 item for $500, assume they are trying to scam you and double down on all the precautions listed above.
Scammers have proliferated because quite frankly, there is no law enforcement. In the vast majority of cases, the scammer is not in your country, so you will be dealing with a foreign county, who unfortunately won't give two dead flies about your misfortune. Two of the biggest scam operations are located in India. They are the source of all the "Your Norton is expiring", "This PayPal Invoice is for the $756 Bit Coins you purchased", "The phone call from Amazon about the Ipad you just ordered" and similar scams. You can even find out who owns these centers via Google and get an idea of the millions of dollars they estimated to be taking in each year. Both the local India law enforcement and national police refuse to do anything about it. Corruption at it's finest!
In the end, the only person who can keep you from being scammed is YOU! Scammers play percentages and prey upon people's ignorance and/or good nature. If they send out 1,000 messages (we often find one scammer contacting more than a dozen people at once on our site) and only 1% bite, that's 10 people they are going to scam. Don't be in that 1%.
