Russell Beattie

So I relisted the Xbox 360 on eBay, and the auction ended this morning. And it turns out that the winner was using a stolen account. Again. That's three times I've tried to list the item, three times that it was won by someone with a stolen account.

WTF?

I have no idea what's going on at eBay, but obviously they've lost complete control over their ability to manage identity thieves and scammers. I understand they are a massive target, but three times is three times too many no matter how much slack you give them.

This is what happens when there's a monopoly in any market - the owner of that monopoly could really give a flying fuck and there's not much else anyone can do about it. Yahoo! closed their auction recently, and besides Craig's List, there's really no other place you can reliably sell stuff. eBay knows this of course, and therefore has no incentive at all to get their ship in order. If it was Microsoft, I'd bet there'd have been a massive outcry by now and maybe even a government investigation into graft, since eBay is obviously profiting handsomely from so much corruption... I'm not sure how eBay continues to get away with it.

Anyways, I *still* have what is essentially a brand new 360 and a ton of extras if you're in the market.

-Russ

Update: Oh, this is just great. 2 minutes after I posted this, I get an email from eBay saying this:

Account Security Notice: eBay Listing(s) Removed
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Dear russbeattie (russ@russellbeattie.com),

The results of the following listing(s) have been cancelled due to bidding activity that took place without the account owner's authorization:

250157806777 Microsoft Xbox 360 Premium Edition Plus Tons of Extras
250158769775 Microsoft Xbox 360 Premium Edition Plus Tons of Extras

We have cancelled the listing(s) to maintain the integrity of the eBay site, your account, and the bidder's account that was accessed.

What does it mean to have "cancelled"? It means completely, 100% erased from the records. It's like it never existed. And if you go to the link, you'll get a message saying exactly that. Now, here's the thing. Once I found out the leading bidder was a scammer, I sent off a Second Chance notice to the other bidders, but now that's all cancelled as well. And there's no way to simply relist the item. The photos, descriptions and settings are all gone. If I want to try to sell it again, I have to start from scratch.

Why would eBay erase all traces of a scammed auction like this? Maybe to hide the fact that there's so many scams going on? I think so.

-R