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Thursday, May 11, 2006

Scamming The Scammer

Dear PeskyGodson,

The blog is always looking for contributors.

Michael

***********

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Alright. Well, I see that there is a coming soon item about “pimping a
laptop.” I’d like to offer another laptop story: The P-P-P-Powerbook .

It’s a 20-or-so-page pdf which details some fun a guy named Jeff had
with an eBay scammer. Basically, Jeff goes and puts a powerbook up for
sale on eBay. He hears back from someone who’s a bit too eager, and,
after a bit of research, turns out to be using a fake address and an
even faker escrow service. The scammer’s plan is to have the powerbook
sent to him while Jeff thinks the money is waiting in a bogus escrow
service. Jeff and his friends on his favorite message board hatch a
plan: they create a fake laptop. The pictures are on pages 10 and 11
and they are priceless. They then mail it, and declare it as a $2000
laptop for customs purposes (the scammer lives in England). The
scammer ends up paying hundreds of dollars in import tax, and ends up
with a ridiculous looking “laptop”.

Some of the language used in the description of the event might offend
the sensibilities of some of your readers (after all, your Mother does
read the blog), so you may want to just offer a summary (or edit mine)
and post it along with the pictures, rather than link to the (somewhat
long and tiresome) website.

Charlie

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posted by michael at 5:50 pm  

7 Comments »

  1. OK, so I actually read most of that, but I’m not sure I followed it all … did Jeff ever actually sell the real powerbook? (There was one, right?) I thought e-bay pointed out to him that he had received a real bid. And there is no chance that the scammer thinks that Jeff planned to scam him before he planned to scam Jeff, right?

    Comment by Jennifer — May 11, 2006 @ 10:41 pm

  2. I’ve long dreamed of turning Mike’s blog into the SA forum experience. My hat’s off to you, Pesky Godson.

    Comment by Travis — May 12, 2006 @ 1:15 am

  3. If the scammer had an inkling he wouldn’t have paid the import fees.

    Travis, be careful what you wish for. The only thing left on your old list (now that the firewood has been moved from way over there to right up against the house) is to do away with our land lines.

    Comment by michael — May 12, 2006 @ 6:29 am

  4. So if Jeff and his network could actually find “Gianluca’s” physical location, he’d better hope the reverse ain’t true, or Vinnie ‘n Guido will be showing up soon to settle the score. And Jeff was anxious about customs …

    Comment by adam — May 13, 2006 @ 7:42 am

  5. Re #1 and #3: I meant (in 1): And there is no chance that the scammer now thinks that Jeff must have planned to scam him in the first place, right?

    Comment by Jennifer — May 13, 2006 @ 8:28 am

  6. I can’t believe I spent 30 minutes (or more) or my precious Sunny Saturday reading the 20 pp pdf top to bottom. But I was riveted. More intricate that the plot-line of Crash that Ginger recommended.

    Pesky, was there a final message from the Scammer???

    Comment by smiling Dan — May 20, 2006 @ 11:27 am

  7. No, no final message that I know of. Clearly, after being scammed himself, he saw the error in his ways and never tried to scam anyone ever again….

    …if only the world worked that way.

    Comment by pesky godson — May 20, 2006 @ 12:53 pm

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