Scam Alert

KnifeKnutQ

KnifeKnutQ

Gold Member
Feedback: +14 / =0 / -0
Joined
Jul 20, 2020
Messages
168
I spoke with the seller today and he encouraged me to post about this as it may help raise awareness and prevent someone from getting scammed.

I recently responded to a member’s for sale post that I will by their knife. I private messaged them and payment was made. It was late at night and the other member retired for the evening. Within an hour, I received a text message from someone claiming to be the seller.

He wanted me to send a screenshot of the payment, which made me wonder why since I already did in our private messages. He then claimed he sent me the wrong email address and if I could please cancel the payment and resend it. Because I sent it “Friends & Family”, cancelling the payment was not an option. Long story short, I didn’t consider that person texting me was not the real seller and was impersonating them. I basically spent the better part of the night and into the next morning cancelling the payment. After the real seller messaged me in the morning, I then realized that someone was impersonating them.

Long story short, everything was ironed out between the real seller and I, but the impersonator almost got me into sending them the money. Yes, I know sending Friends & Family is risky.

Be aware that some scammers are seeing public for sale posts then impersonating the seller and reaching out to the buyer. How he got my mobile phone number is still a mystery. There were several red flags that would have tipped me off.

I consider this as a lesson learned. I hope this raises awareness and beware. Luckily I didn't lose any funds, just sleep and frustration. Scammers are getting tricky.
 
SharpBits said:
You need to go through all your old posts and delete your phone number. The scammers search the site looking for them. Report the other number to your cell carrier and then block it.
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The thing is I never shared my number pubicly. And the number the impersonator texted me at was on my work mobile, which I never share publicly. The seller suggested maybe the impersonator got my work mobile from LinkedIn, but I just scoured my profile and it is not on their either.
 
You can avoid most of these scams if you verify in PM here if you get unsolicited emails or texts. Think of it kinda like a 2FA security. These scammers count on getting a quick reaction without the buyer taking time to verify anything.
 
JJ_Colt45 said:
You can avoid most of these scams if you verify in PM here if you get unsolicited emails or texts. Think of it kinda like a 2FA security. These scammers count on getting a quick reaction without the buyer taking time to verify anything.
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Yeah, it made me wonder why the imposter was asking for a screenshot when I already sent one via a PM. I later realized it's becuase they can't see PMs.
 
Is your business a clinic?

Edit: you put Mike q in your images, posted email here https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/sold-empedc-nymble-3rd-production-run-bronze-hardware.1861694/, posted location here https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/wtb-diskin-fire.1829947/#post-21252955. Using that some info pages come up for you with at least three phone numbers associated with the name

Another edit, your PayPal.me link here gives the rest after Q presumably: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads...-old-guard-insert-lock.1826109/#post-20915429. Michael plus that pulls up a lot on someone who lives in the same place, I assume you.

Didn't look past that and will stop there, but that's a lot of private info to go through to find a work number
 
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One of the scammers here was caught in process and bragged that this place is an easy target and said something like “it’s so easy, why wouldn’t I ?”

People need to make it harder and practice some opsec.
 
kreole said:
Is your business a clinic?

Edit: you put Mike q in your images, posted email here https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/sold-empedc-nymble-3rd-production-run-bronze-hardware.1861694/, posted location here https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/wtb-diskin-fire.1829947/#post-21252955. Using that some info pages come up for you with at least three phone numbers associated with the name

Another edit, your PayPal.me link here gives the rest after Q presumably: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads...-old-guard-insert-lock.1826109/#post-20915429. Michael plus that pulls up a lot on someone who lives in the same place, I assume you.

Didn't look past that and will stop there, but that's a lot of private info to go through to find a work number
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Wow, that's pretty good detective work. No, I'm an analyst with FedEx, which is on my LinkedIn profile. I guess if you really want to, you can find someone's info, escpecailly if they have a web prescence like I do. I need to be more diligent and not so naive about assuming someone is who they say they are. My first time almost getting scammed. It was for over $800 so, no small beans.
 
KnifeKnutQ said:
Wow, that's pretty good detective work. No, I'm an analyst with FedEx, which is on my LinkedIn profile. I guess if you really want to, you can find someone's info, escpecailly if they have a web prescence like I do. I need to be more diligent and not so naive about assuming someone is who they say they are. My first time almost getting scammed. It was for over $800 so, no small beans.
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All paid members should only accept payment information via PM.
Contacts and information received via phone and email should always be suspect, whether you are a paid member or not.

These scammers are pros. This is how they make their money and they are very good at it.
 
The scammers seem to be overwhelmingly Indian. Apparently it's the countries favorite hobby.
 
Bigburly912 said:
If he had your email it probably wasnt a text. Probably an Imessage?
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That makes more sense. I am Apple/Iphone ignorant and prefer Android instead. I have an Iphone, but it is work issued. I rarely use it for anything. Apple's designs are gorgeous, I just don't care for the OS.
 
KnifeKnutQ said:
That makes more sense. I am Apple/Iphone ignorant and prefer Android instead. I have an Iphone, but it is work issued. I rarely use it for anything. Apple's designs are gorgeous, I just don't care for the OS.
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Oh yeah if you have that email associated with your iphone account you can receive messages through it. Thats how he got ya.
 
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