Buyer Fraud Scam

[jacorliss]

Seems like there may be a new buyer fraud scam on high value items on eBay.  In a nutshell, a buyer that wants to secure a lower price will use other straw accounts to bid up the price, only to have each account cancel their bid within seconds of a new straw account continuing to drive up the price.  At the very end of the auction, the final straw account cancels, and the bid goes to the last remaining account at a huge discount.  Anyone else seeing this pattern?  This seems like an obvious gambit, and it makes eBay completely unusable for selling high value items.

[monster-deals]

---

@sin-n-dex wrote:

---

@monster-deals wrote:

• If there are 12 hours or more left before the listing ends, all of your bids can be retracted
• If the listing is ending in less than 12 hours, you can retract your most recent bid if it's been less than an hour since you placed it

Switch to BIN if you are worried.

---

If it's been less than an hour, the bidder could bid 30 min before the end and cancel at the last minute. I know you can't cancel in less than 12 hours of ending, but that one hour allowance permits bidding and cancelling at the last minute.

C.

---

That is C/P'd right from ebay.

[a_c_green]

---

@ittybitnot wrote:

@jacorliss 

The procedure you are describing is called "bid shielding" .  Unfortunately, we cannot see who "retracted" in your bid history, and since all IDs are now masked and what they are bidding on is no longer displayed, it is basically impossible to see if they are making a habit of this on other listings.    

---

Absolutely you can view the bidders' history. Of the four bid retractions seen in the Bid History for that item, bidder (76) has 6 retractions. Bidder (21) has zero retractions. Bidder (140) has 41 retractions, and bidder (27), the latest one, has no fewer than 71 retractions. (Click on the disguised bidder IDs on the Bid History page to see their statistics. The seller himself can go to the bidders' feedback pages to see the same details, after clicking on the bidder's Feedback as a Buyer tab. Bid Retractions are shown on the right side of the Feedback as a Buyer tab, about halfway down.)

The latest two to retract their bids look to be working together, based on the precise timings of when the bids were made and when they were retracted. (Oddly, the timestamp of the latest retraction is 2 Sep 2021 at 12:00:54pm PDT, when the auction itself is shown as ended one second earlier, at 12:00:53pm PDT.)

@jacorliss : Unfortunately this does look like a case of bid shielding, but the evidence is only circumstantial, so it's your call as to whether you want to take the hit of cancelling a sale that the purported buyer won fair and square. I don't think anyone here recommends selling a big-ticket item like a laptop without at least making it Local Pickup Only for cash. No one halfway across the country (or halfway around the world) has a pressing need for your particular laptop. Good luck with whatever you decide to do.

[katzrul15]

---

@a_c_green wrote:

---

@ittybitnot wrote:

@jacorliss 

The procedure you are describing is called "bid shielding" .  Unfortunately, we cannot see who "retracted" in your bid history, and since all IDs are now masked and what they are bidding on is no longer displayed, it is basically impossible to see if they are making a habit of this on other listings.    

---

Absolutely you can view the bidders' history. Of the four bid retractions seen in the Bid History for that item, bidder (76) has 6 retractions. Bidder (21) has zero retractions. Bidder (140) has 41 retractions, and bidder (27), the latest one, has no fewer than 71 retractions.

The latest two to retract their bids look to be working together, based on the precise timings of when the bids were made and when they were retracted. (Oddly, the timestamp of the latest retraction is 2 Sep 2021 at 12:00:54pm PDT, when the auction itself is shown as ended one second earlier, at 12:00:53pm PDT.)

@jacorliss : Unfortunately this does look like a case of bid shielding, but the evidence is only circumstantial, so it's your call as to whether you want to take the hit of cancelling a sale that the purported buyer won fair and square. I don't think anyone here recommends selling a big-ticket item like a laptop without at least making it Local Pickup Only for cash. No one halfway across the country (or halfway around the world) has a pressing need for your particular laptop. Good luck with whatever you decide to do.

---

@jacorliss 

Seriously consider what is posted above by @a_c_green 

We cannot tell you how to proceed, but give his comments serious consideration.

Good luck!

[jacorliss]

 I appreciate all the input, I've already put this one to bed.  I believe I'm justified in cancelling the order given that I intended to conduct a US-only transaction, only to have a foreign bidder shipping to a freight forwarder. Just too much risk for my blood.  If I end up relisting this item I will be making those terms clear, but I will probably also take the recommendation to just do a BIN.