Hi Fred. This is priceless. I had a similar situation a few weeks back. It's incredible how these people work. Thanks for reminding us how we can be scammed very easily unless we pay attention. Thank you. Gregg K1GLD Bartonville, Texas
I have had a somewhat similar experience. I have been approached (unsolicited) by two hams doing their homework. It seems that these two good guys had "wanted to buy" ads posted. The bad guy/scammer is using my call sign to sell items he doesn't have to these good guys, using my call sign/id. I do not know either of the two good guys, but did email with them when they contacted me. My call sign is AC8QJ, my first name is Marc. The scammer went to google and created the id of marcac8qj@gmail.com This is NOT my email, and hope that this will raise some awareness. I had recently placed a for sale ad about a week before this event occurred. They troll among us, please be aware ! regards -marc AC8QJ
Sorry if this is a repeat as I did not read all 16 pages of posts, but one thing I would add to Fred's list is to report the information to bank when given banking information like that. The old investigator's adage "follow the money" is right on. Most if not all banks have an "OI" (Operational Integrity), Compliance department, fraud desk or some other named function that receives and acts on reports of their institutions being used to further fraudulent activity. Apologies if the foregoing is a repeat... 73, Chris
The DHL waybill tracks back to Chennai, India shipped August 1, went through DFW in Texas for delivery on August 4.
Here at work we love receiving bank wire transfers. Because it is just like cash. When it is let go it is gone. When we suspect some sort of fraud we tell them we can only accept wire transfers. Stops them in their tracks. So yes, avoid wire transfers (unless you actually know the person). Unfortunately a call like mine is too short for gmail. Adding anything ruins the point of the call lol. There are other email sites that it does work. PM if curious, don't want to make it too easy for the fly-by reader. _
I really hope folks read this. Obviously quite a few have, but there will always be that "stuff like that doesn't happen to me" attitude..... Would be great to have a hyper link that leads to this story on every classified, but at least add a disclaimer like "although most are honest people here, there has been a growing number of scams that are becoming more realistic looking everyday, but please take the time to read my personal experience with a scamme here - and tthen to the hyper link...... I know it adds bandwidth, but I'm willing to contribute more each year to help out others! You did good.! This is great! Doug K4GKJ
Because they simple DON'T CARE. recently, a fellow ham got burned on Ebay on an Icom VHF radio. Seller was quick to take his money, posted a bogus tracking number to Paypal, and spit out all kinds of garbage lies when confronted. http://www.ebay.com/itm/icom-ic-f50...15511?pt=2_Way_Radios_FRS&hash=item3a94e4a4b7 After some quick checking from a local private investigator, the fraudster is a CONVICTED FELON ON PAROLE, for...wait for it....stealing a car while impersonating a United States Marine. This person's offenses all involve theft or forgery and go back years. Not the first time, and sure won't be there last. The local ham went the extra mile contacting his parole officer and the sheriff's office in the state where the scammer lives. The parole officer acted somewhat interested, but the sheriff's office acted as if they could care less. The actually told him "well, you got your money back from Paypal, what do you expect us to do?" Meanwhile, Mr. Scammer is busy demonstrating he is certainly doing his level best at continuing to attempt to scam people on Craigslist, Ebay and Facebook with various petty crimes. Guess the time he did in prison was just a short break from victimizing others. That is the bottom line: you cannot expect the cops to do anything about these scams. You have to follow your best judgement. In the local hams case, the warning signs were there. Look at the Ebay ad: no actual item photos, vague description, new account with no feedback. Ebay and online sales are like playing the craps table. You should NEVER bet more than you can AFFORD to lose. At least in his case, Ebay and Paypal reversed the charges and he got his money back. Always buy the SELLER not theITEM. If it sounds too good to be true, than it probably is. Paypal is about the best chance you have of recovery IF you are ripped off but only on non-delivery of goods outside of Ebay. However, Paypal transactions outside of Ebay don't have any recourse for "item not as described". So long as the seller provides a valid tracking number that shows delivery to your address, Paypal will walk away and tell you to take em' to court, as they don't guarantee anything outside of Ebay when it comes to items matching a seller's description. Bottom line, do your research! Nice work Fred! Called this scamming turd out!
Great article! A few years ago I was selling an FT-1000 MK V Field. A fellow in "Scotland" wanted to buy it and wanted to send me a money order for twice the amount. His claim was that he owed someone in the US some money and did not want to pay the exchange rate twice. I was to keep what was owed and sent the rest to the other party in the states. The whole thing smelled bad on the surface and a quick check of the Scottish call found a warning on that look up of this scam. Seems some Nigerians have repeatedly used the call of a Scottish Boy Scout ARC. Needless to say, I responded to the buyer appropriately. One more step you should take if you spot interstate web fraud like this - go to www.fbi.gov and file an internet fraud report. There is an easy to use page for citizens. 73, Lee Barrett - K7NM
Very, very well done Fred! By the way, this topic would be of great interest at the Huntsville Hamfest. 73 Johnny, KR4F Huntsville Hamfest Forum Chairman
This scammer is sooooo stupid ! or uneductated. What stupid logic brought him to try this here ? For such things he will have Interpol on his back for quite sometime. Hope he will be soon framed and arrested provided that a complaint has been filed for the first scam he apparently succeeded to finalize, which I assume was not the first one in his whole "carrier" of thief. Jean-Pierre
Nice work Fred. Here's a funny story: a few years ago I advertised online that I wanted to obtain a manual for my Racal RA-17 receiver. Another "ham" responded and said he would sell me the manual. I then asked him whether the manual was for the specific model of RA-17 (there were many variations) that I had. He confirmed that it was and emailed me a photo of his RA-17 as proof. Only problem was: he had lifted the photo from MY website, so of course it was the exact same model, since my photo had been accurately captioned and was easily found via Google image search. This is another favorite tactic of scammers, watching the "wanted" ads and then offering to sell you exactly what you're looking for. Beware. 73, Neil
A few years back I suddenly got a bunch of emails from fellow hams around the country asking about the condition or history of the radio I had supposedly posted for sale on QRZ.com...at such an amazing price they were naturally suspicious. Of course, I had not posted such an ad. I informed the folks at QRZ, and they told me they were already on the case, that I was not the only one whose call sign had been "borrowed." Thankfully, those who emailed me looked me up and used my actual email address, not the one in the ad. You know, too, that we hams are not the only targets. We just happen to have otherwise helpful sites such as QRZ.com at which relatively high-dollar items are bought and sold by people who are some distance apart. The first thing I would do in any email correspondence is ask a question about the radio such as, "Does it have the antenna tuner button on the front panel or on the rear apron?" If the seller can't answer that, look out! If you really want some entertainment, visit one of the "419 scam" web sites such as http://www.419eater.com/ These sites are run by people who have as a hobby messing with the scum who who prey on the rest of us. Some of the stings they pull off would be hilarious if not for the fact that many folks actually fall for the scam before these stingers can get to the perpetrators. You would be amazed at the lengths some of these idiots go to to try to rip off their "victim" even when it should have become obvious to even the dumbest scammer that they were dealing with someone who was onto their scheme and deliberately messing with them. 73, Don N4KC www.n4kc.com www.donkeith.com (Author of the new book RIDING THE SHORTWAVES: EXPLORING THE MAGIC OF AMATEUR RADIO)
Thanks for the yeoman's work exposing this guy-a victim Hi Fred I was another victim of this guy. apparently the same one, judging by the sentence structure and M.O. I unfortunately got hammered for $2659.00. This guy used a callsign from a ham in D.C. when I tracked back and found the true individual, he turned out to be a professor at American University. Needless to say, he was shocked to find his address and personal info had been hacked. We both filed complaints with the IC-3 division of the FBI, but nothing ever came of it, naturaly. This guy used the exact same woman accountholder, no paypal, Pending surgery,hospital stay for delay and even faked that his daughter was handling his affairs while he was ill. THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN AGAIN! The "Can I pick it up in person" gambit is great-Foolproof! Again, Kudos!
