I get frustrated with Craigslist because every time I post something, I end up getting immediately spammed by 1-5 different people who ask me to accept a money wire from out of state in exchange for my item. I usually reply with vitriol, then ignore their inevitable replies.

Do people actually fall for this nonsense? I imagine they have to be making some money at this somehow, but seriously--is someone in Arkansas shopping for mountain bikes on a local Craigslist site in Utah at the exact moment I post my listing? Who would believe that? Similarly, who falls for those "there is an unclaimed, unwilled $15M waiting for your signature!" scams?

lol my dad sold one thing on craigslist and got like 4 scam emails in a few hours. It was hilarious. They were all broken English and almost impossible to understand. It's like they weren't even trying.

I get frustrated with Craigslist because every time I post something, I end up getting immediately spammed by 1-5 different people who ask me to accept a money wire from out of state in exchange for my item. I usually reply with vitriol, then ignore their inevitable replies.

Do people actually fall for this nonsense? I imagine they have to be making some money at this somehow, but seriously--is someone in Arkansas shopping for mountain bikes on a local Craigslist site in Utah at the exact moment I post my listing? Who would believe that? Similarly, who falls for those "there is an unclaimed, unwilled $15M waiting for your signature!" scams?

If you replied from your email you just got your name on the spam list.

Who would believe that? Similarly, who falls for those "there is an unclaimed, unwilled $15M waiting for your signature!" scams?

The average person who falls for these scams usually loses 15k, and it's usually not their own money. They have access to a business account, etc, and the personal risk is far lower for them.

Really, if you do something a million times, you're going to find one or two people who fall for it, and two people is 30k, which is a significant amount of money, especially from the parts of the 3rd world these scams are usually based in.

Sad to say 2 of my friends fell for this, they lost much less then 15k tho, one was at 3k and the other was like 1k. But cool thing, they actually caught the guy who scammed my friend for 3k prosecuted him and she ended up getting her money back.

Sad to say 2 of my friends fell for this, they lost much less then 15k tho, one was at 3k and the other was like 1k. But cool thing, they actually caught the guy who scammed my friend for 3k prosecuted him and she ended up getting her money back.

Can you provide details? Did they send the thing first before getting the money? How would agreeing to accept a wire transfer make you lose money? Unless they gave their bank account info to the person.

I'm always curious about how people fall for these scams.

[quote name='BeanDog' timestamp='1308761637' post='4826499']
I get frustrated with Craigslist because every time I post something, I end up getting immediately spammed by 1-5 different people who ask me to accept a money wire from out of state in exchange for my item. I usually reply with vitriol, then ignore their inevitable replies.

Do people actually fall for this nonsense? I imagine they have to be making some money at this somehow, but seriously--is someone in Arkansas shopping for mountain bikes on a local Craigslist site in Utah at the exact moment I post my listing? Who would believe that? Similarly, who falls for those "there is an unclaimed, unwilled $15M waiting for your signature!" scams?

If you replied from your email you just got your name on the spam list.
[/quote]
I get about 100-300 spams a day anyway, so it's a drop in the bucket. Gmail's filter only lets about 1 through per day.

Ok so how it happened in both their cases was, that there was suppose to be some kind of transacation to begin with

So the scammer would be like

"I wanna buy the coach from you, Iam going to wire you the money and send someone to pick it up"

It was via some western union type money order or something in the case of my friend who got her 3k back...

Anyhow they "Accidently" send to much money, and ask the person oh can you please send back the difference my secretary wrote the wrong amount

so the person being a good Samaritan actually sends a money order back with that amount, but like 5 to 7 days later (because of the way the bank works) the 4k they deposited in the bank from the check they got from that person bounces, and even though initially the 4k went through they now have a balance of -3k, because they took out the 3K to send back to the person because they thought they mistakenly sent to much money.

In my friends case the guy they were able to trace back because he ended up sending something with some kind of letterhead from where he works, and they traced it back to his job and the employment place helped the police track him down.


On a side note, People like that really piss me off, They are to lazy to try to actually work for their money, so they decide to spend someone elses, My friend in this case was living in housing and defintly could not afford a -3K on her bank account, and she was actually kind of enough to send back the "difference" while some other people might of just tried to get away scott free with the lump sum, luckily she got her money back but she could of potentially been in a really bad spot for doing the right thing.

Hello BeanDog,

Can I speak with you over email? I seen one of your post and It seems you know a lot of what I need.

I have a great website Idea, It involves musicians connecting to record labels. I talked to multiple musicians all said it was a GREAT idea.

There is only one problem. I have no idea how to start this site. That is why I need your help. If you could help me get a start, maybe tell me how to start this. I was told to make the site and upload it.

If you could email me that would be amazing. amcarbonaro@gmail.com

Thanks
-Anthony Carbonaro.

The worst scams are personals scams.. Trust me.