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A few weeks ago I posted a Want to Buy ad for 1940 fenders. The other day I got an email saying this is Bill from Packardinfo.... I have a set of fenders in good shape and excellent condition... Asks where I am located. I write back and say where I live. He says he's in Cleveland. Also writes "The asking price is $300 shipped, kindly send your full shipping address and i will ship and send the tracking as soon as the deal is completed today." Thanks and Best Regards.
No pictures. No talk about anything else to do with it. Just get the money on the way and he'll ship the fenders.
-------there's no fenders, just a petty thief.

These guys are all over Facebook. I suspect they also search the internet using the term "WTB" or "Want To Buy" and end up in stand alone forums like this too.

Be careful out there.

"kindly"

Definitely tells you they are not from this continent. Just saying...

Remember that your email address is not publicly shown on the website or your profile. So, unless you added it to a post, no one should be able to email you directly unless they got it from another source.

If they were here from the website, they should be using the Private Messaging (PM) system, which doesn't expose anyone's email.

That being said, here is a repost from a post I put up a while back:


We have seen a rise in people offering parts and cars for sale only for the purpose of scamming people out of their money. So please be careful when offering to buy items from people unknown to you. Ask for photos, and use Google Photo Search to verify those photos were not stolen from somewhere else.

Pay via a payment source that offers some kind of fraud protection. PayPal, and many credit cards offer it.

Avoid Zelle, Venmo, gift cards, and other direct instant payment schemes. Also, cash and money orders as there is no tracking or recourse.

Also, avoid buying cars and parts from someone who just joined the website in the last few days and doesn't have any online presence here.

The problem with scammers is not unique to this website but is happening across all car websites, Facebook, etc.

So just be careful and cautious. If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is.

But pretty much anyone can make an account, right? I can see his email with my account.

Plenty of emails can easily be searched on data broker websites. (Though his did not come up with any meaningful result on the one I use.)

Like it or not, plenty of info (including mine) ends up on the Internet somehow. Even things like whether you voted, and property search websites can search by name for a small monthly fee. Going to the specific county website will often yield additional data for free. (Realized this when searching for plots of land to buy). On that note, if you have the address, the county will often give you the name of the landowner, as well as on a broker's website.

And I haven't even mentioned the gold mine that is social media. Lots of people I know will accept friend requests from random accounts. Congrats, they can now see your entire profile. Even if you don't have an address or phone number, just with your name and any photos that make obvious your general location you can often figure out the personal info discussed above.

Also, if someone sends you pictures of the item, right click and hit "Search with Google Lens". This will search the internet for matching photos. Recently a member reached out to me about a deal he was suspicious about. I found that the "seller" simply scraped pictures off an active eBay listing and offered it to our member at about half price. So if you see an exact match, you know they are lying. Though note that cropping a photo can defeat this, so also watch out for photos that seem unusually cropped (zoomed in).

Not to weird anyone out here, but these are things it's useful to be aware of. Fortunately, most scammers are very low effort. But they can appear very convincing if they take time to gather info on you. Remember Victor Lustig's (attr.) 10 Commandments for Con Men (though many aren't relevant to text-based internet discussions, many are, and you can contextualize the general theme, which is to be neat, professional, polite, and above all, show interest in the victim's thoughts and opinions):

- Be a patient listener (it is this, not fast talking, that gets a con man his coups).
- Never look bored.
- Wait for the other person to reveal any political opinions, then agree with them.
- Let the other person reveal religious views, then have the same ones.
- Hint at sex talk, but don't follow it up unless the other person shows a strong interest.
- Never discuss illness, unless some special concern is shown.
- Never pry into a person's personal circumstances (they'll tell you all eventually).
- Never boast – just let your importance be quietly obvious.
- Never be untidy.
- Never get drunk.

Quote:

There is a setting in everyone's profile called "Allow other users to view my email address". The default for this is NO. But if a user changes this setting to YES on their own profile, then other users can see their email address.