Aug 8, 2013
For those of you posting on CL if you use the option available on the landing page of a post you're making (or you can also edit a post you've already made), choose the option to have NO email replies to your post you will cut down all of the spamscammers you're getting and also break up any phone numbers you post (e.g. 310.1-55.5>one2one2, or 55.5.12.12 or some variation). I think that some scammers may be using bots or some sort of software to search through postings for properly formatted phone numbers (e.g. 101-555-1212 ). It may be the format of the number or the simple fact that those properly formatted show up as hyper-links.
I don't trust ebay at all. It's to easy to have something you've sold disputed after you've already shipped it and have to go thru those kind of nightmares where you end up losing the item and the money. I've heard a lot of people talking about those type of problems where ebay is concerned. Not to mention that some hackers are so good that a simple exchange of emails or chats or whatever can possibly be used to drop malware packed with all sorts of info stealing tools in them and pilfer your personal info.
I don't think it's a good idea to give unimaginative thieves ideas or actionable intel simply by telling them what they're doing wrong or how you knew they were trying to scam you either (no offense intended). Simply stating that something is a scam or a possible scam should suffice in this type of forum.
Thanks for reading.