BEWARE: ebay's devious solicitation

[ledsled]

Yesterday, ebay's CEO sent a message to ebay members expressing her concern over a two-tiered internet, with a handful of telecommunication companies charging for what is now free. I thought this was a great move on her part: to stand up and share her concerns with the ebay members. The email had a link to make it easy for you to sign something showing your support.

I clicked on the link, thinking I'd have to fill in my name and address, etc., like every other petition. I did not arrive at a petition asking for name and address, however. Instead, I arrived at some kind of "agreement" and needed to check a box showing I agreed to the terms before proceeding. What terms? I skimmed over it and saw that if I checked the box, I would be allowing ebay to share all my information with "the government".

Excuse me? In order for me to support ebay's effort to keep the internet free, they want me to agree to let them share all the information they have about me with the government? Like the trinkets I purchase on ebay have anything to do with criminal activity?

It is deceptive of ebay to lure people into checking that agreement, since the stated purpose of the email was to keep the internet free, NOT to give away more of your privacy by checking a box with a bunch of legal mumbo-jumbo. :rage:

 

[PrettySquareGal]

It sounds like a spoof. I didn't get that email, and it's not in "My Messages." From ebay:

"Forward spoof emails to spoof@ebay.com. If you receive any email that refers to your eBay account and asks you to click on a link, look for the message in your My Messages inbox on the eBay site. If it isn't there, do not click on the link or enter personal information. Forward the email to spoof@ebay.com. This lets us take quick action on the fake website, and we'll respond to you within minutes to tell you if the message really came from eBay."

 

[Maj.Nick Danger]

I got that too.

And I also have it in the my messages section on my ebay mail page. I get the same mail forwarded to my yahoo mail box so I clicked on the link from there. It took me to the ebay sign in page, (or one that looks like it) so I did not sign in with my password.
It didn't look legit to me, even though it's in the messages section at ebay, so I figured I'd wait. [huh]

If it is for real, shouldn't everyone get it?

 

[PrettySquareGal]

If it is for real, shouldn't everyone get it?

I would think so!

 

[Baron Kurtz]

Got it. Ignored it. Like people power is going to do anything about changing the internet.

Thankfully i'm not reliant on internet, so tiering it will not affect me.

bk

 

[Flitcraft]

Received the same e-mail and it does appear to be legitimate- but I do question why they need the information they requested. Seemed a bit much in order to accomplish their stated mission.
I'm with Baron Kurtz on this one- if "people power" prevailed, Ebay wouldn't have raised the listing fees through the roof- much to the detriment of the "little fish" in the ole 'Bay!

 

[Solid Citizen]

If in doubt DELETE IT!

I never respond to any email's from Ebay, they should have all the
info they need from you the day you registered with them.

SC

 

[K.D. Lightner]

That has to be a spoof. Somebody either "phfising" for information or trying to cause mischief.

Ebay and Paypal state that they will never ask you to share your personal information in an email.

karol

 

[NewMexExpat]

May be legit...

I don't know how authoritative any of the sites in the search are, but I Googled the following.....

"two tiered internet" ebay "call-to-action"

....and got some hits that looked relevant. Particularly this one:

http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3610891

According to the article, e-bay did send this out, but would not say to how many subscribers. But, again, I don't know whether internetnews.com is authoritative. I tried finding things on the author, Roy Mark, but got nothing solid.

I also looked for this at SNOPES http://www.snopes.com/ and HOAXBUSTERS, http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org/ and found nothing specific to your description. These are two good sites for checking things out. HOAXBUSTERS is a product of the U.S. Dept. of Energy's cyber security section.

For what it's worth,

- Mark

 

[ITG]

My concern that if it's not a legit ebay thing and if you had to sign in withyour user name and password, the fake ebay site would have your ebay name and password and could then log in and get your address/phone#/credit card info, etc. I didn't get that message. Forward it to the spoof email mentioned above.

 

[ledsled]

NY times article on ebay's tactics

I must get two ebay-related spoofs a day, as well as Paypal and banks I've never even heard of. The thing that made me think this one was real was that it had my ebay name. I wrote a note to ebay clarifying that they do not have my permission to share my information with the government. I have not gotten a reply yet. That's no surprise. Probably my writing them a complaint has caused me to be bumped up on some list to spy on.

I've heard from several other ebay people who have gotten the same email. Most deleted it without responding, but one got to the page I did... and backed out without checking the agreement box.

Here's an email I got from a friend of mine... anybody have the NY times from last Sunday? I'd like to hear about this article:

"Get a copy of yesterday's (Sunday's June 4) NY Times Business section. Big article on how eBay misrepresents things to win favorable legislation in state governments."

Thanks!

 

[Feraud]

Here is a link to the article I think you are referring to.

 

[Flitcraft]

Actually, this also showed up under the "Messages" section of the "My eBay" page- so it does appear to be legitimate.
Still question why they even brought it up?[huh]

 

[ledsled]

Yes, that's the article!

Here is a link to the article I think you are referring to.

Thanks for the link! I'm sure that's the article my friend was referring to. I skimmed it, but will have to read it in more detail when I can hold my head up and keep my eyes open. Have you ever seen the Flintstones episode where Fred kept tried to his eyelids propped open with toothpicks? The pressure of keeping them open becamse too much and the toothpicks snapped. I need to get to bed before my toothpicks snap. lol

Someone here suggested that I forward the email to spoof@ebay.com. I took their advice and did that because I thought it would be interesting to see what kind of song and dance reply I would get.... if any reply at all.

About 5 minutes after forwarding the questionable email from the CEO of ebay, I got an automatically generated acknowledgment that it had been received at ebay. It has been 24 hours since I have sent the message and there's been NO further reply.

Something weird is brewing at ebay, because normally I get a definitive reply from them saying that the spoof really is a spoof, etc. Thus far, I have gotten silence.

If I hear anything, I'll let you know. Thanks again for the link.

 

[skinnychik]

Be careful with things like that. I received an email "from Amazon.com" about 30 min. after ordering from them...which led me to trust its credibility. I shouldn't have. I clicked on a link and it asked for my e-mail address and ebay password. I don;t know how it went from there, but 30 minutes later thar had logged onto my bank account (I did not provide this info) and they changed my bank account access codes. It was weird how quickly they worked. The Amazon people just said, "yeah, it wasn't from us" but posted no warnings about such scams.

I'm just glad I caught it right away.

 

[ledsled]

No reply from ebay yet!

It's been two days since I forwarded ebay the CEO's letter, asking if it is a spoof. While I got an automatic acknowledgement within 5 minutes, they have not answered my inquiry yet!! In the past, I have gotten answers from their spoof address within one day or less.

And it's been quite a while (a week?) since I sent my email to the government address ebay gave in their original CEO's letter. No reply to that either.

Are they understaffed or avoiding drawing attention to a sleezy thing they tried on their members? hmmmmmmmm. I wonder....

 

[Strider]

I once got an e-mail from eBay that appeared official, telling me that my account had been suspended, and providing me with a link to where I could go to re-activate it. I was a little curious as to why my account would be suspended, but I decided to check it out. When I clicked the link, I was taken to a form that wanted such information as my bank account number, debit card number, and PIN number, among other such sensitive information.

That ended it right there, and I didn't fill it out. If my account was suspended, I was perfectly happy never knowing why if finding out why meant giving out that information. A few days later, I logged into my account and everything was fine. Magically re-activated with no problem.

 

[Lady Day]

Im eBay free for over two years now.

Ive lost so much money, time and items buying from that site. I gave up, sent eBay a nasty letter saying how they dont take responsibility for any fraud or malice that is done to is patrons.

Now granted, this was before some of their hard crackdowns, you know, back when bargins still really exsisted and back before you checked eBay for 'industry standard pricing'.

I feel so sorry for all the crap ya'll are going through with eichBay.

LD