Scam Warning: Account Hacking and PayPal Friends and Family

[C_Claycomb]

It appears that the account of @9InchNinja has been hacked and used to defraud one of our members.

9InchNinja

bushcraftuk.com

This type of scam has been discussed at length and for some time over on Bushcraft USA, but if it has happened here before it has been so uncommon that I cannot recall it. I recommend looking at these threads on BCUSA because they have written more than I have or can here.

Warning: PayPal Friends and Family Scam

The new scam is to hack into existing member accounts that are well known and sell goods that don’t exist. This is to take advantage of the trust the member has built up along the way. The scammers try to get you to use PP F&F so you have no recourse. It is the strong recommendation of the forum...

bushcraftusa.com

Account/Password Security

We would like to remind everyone how important it is for you to protect your account via strong passwords and other available security measures. Recently a member had his account hacked and it created quite an issue as the hacker was trying to sell items disguised as the trusted member. A few...

bushcraftusa.com

The scam involves gaining access to an existing member's account, offering items for sale, particularly via PM in response to Want adverts, then asking for payment by Paypal Friends and Family.

Watching out for scams during transactions:
9InchNinja was very active here in 2015, but very little since. The original account holder isn't likely to notice and report activity in an account they don't use any more. You can check posting patterns via profiles.

The photos of goods that were shared via PM had a label that almost looked like a hand written name card, almost but not quite...actually photo-shopped in. The photos didn't show matches when image searched via Google and TinEye, but those searches showed a similar item for sale on eBay, from Ukraine, on an identical and very distinctive background material.

This is why we advise against PayPal F&F.

Protect your account:
In addition to the need to be careful when buying or selling via the forum, this also highlights the importance of using strong and unique passwords. The most common means for accounts to be hacked is when people use the same passwords with the same email addresses and same usernames on multiple platforms. A data breach at one exposes all the rest. There is excellent advice on the BCUSA thread.

You can check whether your email address or password has been part of a known breach here:

Have I Been Pwned: Check if your email address has been exposed in a data breach

Have I Been Pwned allows you to check whether your email address has been exposed in a data breach.

haveibeenpwned.com

Best regards

Chris

 

[C_Claycomb]

Thread locked and all participating posts removed. A member began an argument with the moderators and objecting to my last remark when I locked the thread at 1:11am, has threatened legal action.

A member (No1) asked whether the advice to use only Goods and Services when paying by PayPal could be made a rule. There had already been Stickied posts stating that PayPal as gifts had to stop (2011), that PayPal should be G&S (2020) and that it shall be G&S 2021. So it was at last made explicit in the main rules.

It was also discussed that while the moderators can insist that advertising posts do not ask for PayPal F&F, and the rule might act as a red flag in Want ad replies, what people agree via PM is beyond our view and essentially unenforceable.

That the rules have been updated to explicitly state G&S should be used does not mean that sales by BACS or cash are prohibited. All parts of a sale carry risk of fraud, but at present there appears to be more activity of scammers asking for PayPal F&F and not sending anything than refund fraud or sending items not as described.

One member (No2) hotly contested this “new” G&S rule as providing protection to buyers, but exposing sellers to refund fraud. This was cited as having happened to this member up to 5 times on this forum, as a result of which they have not sold here since 2017. I could find no record of reports of these frauds and the member stated they didn’t report because they can look after themselves. Member No2 objected to an observation I made in my last post and that by locking the thread I had slandered him and shut off his right of reply. He says he has screen shotted everything, posted it elsewhere and is threatening legal action.

While this situation plays out, all the posts from everyone have been removed.