Beware of Webinterpret’s scam that ebay is allowing

[bigdeals.etc]

A couple of days ago a banner within my Seller Hub advertised reaching buyers in ebay international sites (shown in screenshot). I clicked it to learn what it was about. It pushed me to a 3rd party page (Webinterpret) explaining what it was and allowed me to register/sign up for their service. I didn’t sign up and just closed the page.

The next day, Webinterpret hacked into my ebay account. They duplicated all of my listings 4-6 times each listing. My usual 200 live listings became over 1200 listings. Each listing was specific to an ebay international website (au, uk, ca, de, etc.). They basically duplicated my inventory quantity as well… obviously I don’t have that much inventory to cover it. Beware, this is on ebay’s Main Seller Hub page that ebay is advertising.

Read further if you want to know ebay’s response to this:

I called my ebay concierge and after a few hours of asking around and researching, he called me back and said the company has been with ebay since 2011, they shouldn’t have access to your account without your signing up, authorizing, generating a token, etc. I told him I did none of that and the agent was confused on how the company was able to hack into my account like that. The agent helped me remove the duplicate listings manually (took awhile) and revoked any access from that company to my account. I checked and it appears many ebay members (dated as far back as 4 years) had the exact same thing happen to them and did the revoking, only to find months later the company hacks back into their accounts doing the same thing… sometimes even billing them. Ebay says they will check on it, but then again… this problem has been around for at least 4 years now and ebay hasn’t done anything about it.

I’m just warning others to NOT click on that banner.

[ted_200]

When I go to my seller account it says "too many charges to display" please request a report. I request a report and 24 hours later no update.

Are you serious?  You have to make a request to see what they've charged you? 

Hundreds of sellers are going to get huge fee increases once the free trial ends, many who don't even know they're on the plan.

Many got charged fees right off the top, I suspect (too many charges to display).  The promotion this thing was tied to was only for 3,000 listings, so if your listings times however many sites are involved is over 3,000...  Plus the promotion fine print said it excluded GSP listings, so any of those might have been charged regardless (if the thrid party service did in fact convert and list those listings). 

Seller on PSDB reported they sold one off the France site, and the other listings on the other sites did not end (it's a single quantity item listing), they had to end them manually.  This thing is a HUGE OOS Defect trap too, apparently. 

[bubbleman2010]

ebay runs like a regular shell game at the carnival or any 3 card monty game in NYC and no matter how foolish the things are they do folks just keep falling for it...  

[ted_200]

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@bubbleman2010 wrote:

ebay runs like a regular shell game at the carnival or any 3 card monty game in NYC and no matter how foolish the things are they do folks just keep falling for it...  

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I'm sorta used to the street hustle / con from eBay, it's their M.O....  they promise you a free unicorn with a cheery Announcement, then give you a donkey with a traffic cone on it's head and you find out 3 weeks later it wasn't really free.  This one has a new added flavor with the click link that bypassed all the T&C and signed them up and executed the listings in an instant.  The street hustle relies on gullible spectators agreeing to play... this one was more like an innocent bypasser getting dragged into an alley and having their wallet stolen. 

[newview]

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@ted_200 wrote:

... this one was more like an innocent bypasser getting dragged into an alley and having their wallet stolen. 

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Fingered by eBay as to who to drag into the alley, then mugged by Webinterpret while eBay stood by and watched ... 

[deja8318]

Basically a great sum up... I read everything before I act. This time by a simple click to actually read what the promo was I got swooped into the alley... Learned my lesson not touching anything..

[ittybitnot]

but I've been watching it flaot to the top waiting for the multi-color logo to appear, indicating a Staff reply.

Are you still waiting?  Seems like everybody knows what is up but them.   It was suggested that the ebay blues had the weekend off. Guess they had Monday as well.  Simply AMAZING. 

[d-k_treasures]

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@ted_200 wrote:

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@bubbleman2010 wrote:

ebay runs like a regular shell game at the carnival or any 3 card monty game in NYC and no matter how foolish the things are they do folks just keep falling for it...  

---

I'm sorta used to the street hustle / con from eBay, it's their M.O....  they promise you a free unicorn with a cheery Announcement, then give you a donkey with a traffic cone on it's head and you find out 3 weeks later it wasn't really free.  This one has a new added flavor with the click link that bypassed all the T&C and signed them up and executed the listings in an instant.  The street hustle relies on gullible spectators agreeing to play... this one was more like an innocent bypasser getting dragged into an alley and having their wallet stolen. 

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Oh, you still get the unicorn ...............

[kclim0828]

looks like it is corrected now...

i had originally little over 2400 listings...and within two to three days..went to 9000 plus...now all the foreign listings are gone..

after i received a confirm email from Webinterpret...to stop all actions and delete.

[usgamecollector]

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@ted_200 wrote:

When I go to my seller account it says "too many charges to display" please request a report. I request a report and 24 hours later no update.

Are you serious?  You have to make a request to see what they've charged you? 

Hundreds of sellers are going to get huge fee increases once the free trial ends, many who don't even know they're on the plan.

Many got charged fees right off the top, I suspect (too many charges to display).  The promotion this thing was tied to was only for 3,000 listings, so if your listings times however many sites are involved is over 3,000...  Plus the promotion fine print said it excluded GSP listings, so any of those might have been charged regardless (if the thrid party service did in fact convert and list those listings). 

Seller on PSDB reported they sold one off the France site, and the other listings on the other sites did not end (it's a single quantity item listing), they had to end them manually.  This thing is a HUGE OOS Defect trap too, apparently. 

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i've actually sold 5 items so far from 5K+ listings, however none of them except one have paid yet. I don't know why people aren't paying. I don't know what the listings above the 3K free ones were charged since it says I have too many charges to view. My other listings were all ended automatically when the item sold, so that is something they actually did right. The one person that did pay paid in GBP so I had to take a huge loss on the paypal conversion rate. I don't know if customers on other ebay sites can pay in USD or only with the site's default currency.

[chrysylys]

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@chrysylys wrote:

I haven't been reading this thread after the first page or so, but I've been watching it flaot to the top waiting for the multi-color logo to appear, indicating a Staff reply.  I can understand not seeing it over the weekend, but now we're far enough into a business day that there should have been one.

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They have now responed to several other threads in the last couple of hours, but still nothing here.

[alan@ebay]

Hi all, 

We're looking into this topic. When we have information to share we'll let you know. 

Thank you! 

[ymeagainlord]

Maybe "calm people down" was the wrong phrasing....how about "quell the flames before they reached wildfire proportions"? = )

[odjbnork1917]

I thought the Webinterpret might help my business. So far I've sold two items to customers in the UK via the additional Webinterpret listings. But something seems to have gone wrong regarding the shipping cost. When I print a label for an item I sold, the total shipping cost paid by the buyer in both cases comes up for about $10 lower the amount I entered when I created the listing, which was equal to what it costs me to ship the item. I called ebay customer service about the problem, and was told that so far only about ten sellers have called to complain about this. Has anyone else who sold an item through the Webinterpret program had better luck  with the shipping amount?

[usgamecollector]

did your buyer in the uk pay in usd or GBP?

[deja8318]

Its now the 8th... Banner is back in my Hub... Still have not received a response from this company to either of their email addresses... I let a lot of things go with errors glitches problems here.. But this one I am not, Access was given to a Third Party to my Ebay Account by an Ebay Promo with no terms in that banner... they already have my email addy god knows what else... I still have not gotten any clear answers... CS says I have to contact the third party to Opt Out which I have twice... I am not getting any responses, so Ebay I am going to need you to step in here... You allowed this to happen