Serious privacy issue - receiving ebay notifications meant for another ebay buyer/seller

[carlstev]

For over a month I'm receiving legitimate eBay correspondence meant for another eBay user. Huge privacy issue which also brings into question the privacy of my personal information. I have phoned eBay and was told it was spoofed, spam or phishing and send to spoof@ebay.com (done), but the emails clearly are genuine eBay emails - no action. Emailed customerhelp@ebay.com and customerhelp_uk@ebay.com, received a couple of encouraging replies, then silence! And still no change, I am still getting someone else's offers, marketing and auction bid/loss/win notifications, and reminders to pay up.

Screenshot attached with all eBay email saturating my inbox - note, I am not caste_8668 (who these emails are intended for).

How to formally escalate to upper management to own and run with this issue to resolution?

[eburtonlab · Accepted solution]

@carlstev 

Is it possible that the user has an email address similar to yours (off by one character, or at a different domain), and has mistakenly entered your email address in the "Receive messages from other members" field in his account settings?

That field appears obscured in the account settings: communications preferences, and if the user normally reads and responds to eBay messages in his eBay account, he may not be aware that the messages are not reaching his mailbox.

If you have not already tried, you might consider sending the user a message through one of his listings or his profile page, alerting him that his messages are winding up your mailbox -- although it too will wind up in your mailbox, he may still see it in his eBay messages.

[pburn]

Perhaps if you used eBay messaging to contact the sender, s/he could help figure out the problem. I see the intended recipient is fairly new to eBay--registered in late May, so perhaps s/he isn't even realize there's an issue . . .

EDITED TO ADD: Just noticed eburtonlab already suggested this. Sorry!

[berserkerplanet]

Gmail address?

Gmail ignores periods in email addresses and apparently also ignores anything after a + sign in the address and routes it to the base address - it's possible the other user has a gmail address similar to yours but with periods and/or more bits on it.
https://support.google.com/mail/answer/10313?hl=en
https://www.kiwiforgmail.com/blog_view.php?id=80&c=

You might look at the raw headers of one of those emails and look to see if an address close to yours appears in them in the to header, any "apparently to" headers, etc to see if that is what is happening.


>>How to formally escalate to upper management to own and run with this issue to resolution?

There is no way other than calling CS

[carlstev]

sadly its my Hotmail address but I'm aware of the gmail concatenation and parsing. Email headers sent to eBay for analysis, no response on multiple occasions and no response of any value throughout. I appreciate the reply, cheers.

[carlstev]

After figuring out how to search and contact an eBay user by member name I sent them a message explaining the issue and asked them to check the hotmail address in their account, I have not received any further notifications since so either they checked and corrected or has not been active on eBay. Fingers crossed and thanks for your reply, appreciated /c

[carlstev]

thanks pburn, that is the angle I approached it at, contacted them and have not got any further correspondence since - hoping they corrected it and are not just inactive right now, thanks for the reply, best /c

[etrusca]

I think they are spoofed - I tried putting the item number in the US and UK site under active and sold

nothing - I also tried doing a search under seller name Vauxhall Astra and got nothing - Have you asked ebay to verifiy either of these? if they are not legit than someone has hijacked your acct and thats what you may need help

with - they may want to hook you by having you write them so I would be very careful communicating with them.

It very unusual to have so many communications on one sold item without being blocked - there is also another user name showing towards the end - I would not open the messages either - they may be a hook. Make sure also you are definitely on the Ebay website when you see open your message section - check the url above for anything unusual - I would also check your task manager and see if you have something running when you are not logged on to

good luck!

[eburtonlab]

@etrusca 

I am able to see that Vauxhall Astra listing in the US, though it is indeed from the UK site:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/401791291174

[etrusca]

thanks - I stand corrected - bizarre - doesnt show on Ebay  uk under listing or number

nor does number populate any data under solds

noticed seller does have spelling problem with typos in listing so I think your assessment is correct he mispelled his  email address or maybe hotmail allowed 2 of the same name ? you never know !

New Ebayer only since March probably doesnt use the message system or realize he has an issue 

Ebay supervisor should take over and take some responsibility to correct for OP - what a drag

to have this happen - it should be escalated especially if perhaps he isnt getting his own or maybe this person can also see his stuff - yikes

[etrusca]

ps used to live in London 20 yrs back- Vauxhall is also a district so I wasnt reading this right -knew of the old cars - didnt realize they are still in business - thx for setting me straight