"Phish attempt via eBay?" Topic

I received a message through a valid account on eBay asking if I would combine shipping if they won multiple items.

A common question, but, however, several red flags were raised:

1) The account has been active since July, but no feedback. (not uncommon)
2) The spelling was terrible. (again, not uncommon)
3) The item they asked about is a set of miniatures and the screen name is distinctly feminine. (once more, not uncommon)
4) The item referenced is not like any other item I have on the block. So why would they bid on both my "Apples" AND my "Oranges?"

But all of these combined made me take pause. I politely answered the question yes, and made sure my e-mail address was not visible to the recipient.

Fortunately, for me, the item referenced is the last one to end, so I will know if this person was a serious bidder or not.

I will forward the email to eBay just to make sure they have something to watch, but I know all they will say is no eBay rules were violated.

I'm posting this mostly to make the TMP community aware of the possibility of this kind of phish.

Whenever you get something like this send it to spoof@ebay.com. They'll let you know if it's legit or not.

99% of the time it's not.

I got one the other day in "response" to ask the seller.

Souupsedly I went crazy and was threatening the seller. I never heard of this guy. So I checked my ebay account, and the message (surprise!) wasn't there.

Then I looked at the links, and they were ip/~mike/ebay.c om. Forwarded to spoof.

I've had several attempts recently to promote me to a 'power seller' despite the fact that my selling activities only occur in short bursts. More worringly I've had a number of people tell me that someone has been contacting them claiming to be me and that an item they had bid on but failed to win was available – but obviously not using my screen name or anything else related to me. In one case they contacted a guy who bid $3.03 USD (the item sold for $152.50!)…..I told him if I were him I'd pick up several for that price :)