What are scams made of

ranjeetrain

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Since there is an increased awareness of the 'Gon around this part, and more and more FMs are looking to source their warez from there, I feel this warning is well in order.

Just now, I was lurking there looking for something of my interest. And I did come across something I have been eying for a long time. Even more interesting, the price was mouth watering. I click-opened the listing and didn't take even 5 seconds to ascertain that it's a scam. So, thought of sharing it here.

Today, the 'Gon is no safer than any other worldwide known e-trading platform. It has had a glorious past, but that is well past it. Today when I visit there, I see a lot of scam ads. Just put "Audiogon scam" in any search engine and see what you get.

I have to admit that I have been lurking there frequently. But I am shocked to see how much more frequent fraudulent ads there have become there. It used to be a hifi lovers' heaven at some point in time, with a tightly knit community of genuine hifi lovers. Alas, marketeer and scammers leave no place untouched. Check out this listing for instance. It will leave no doubts in anyone's mind, unless a person blindly trusts everyone including good folks in Nigeria.

The listing is offering to sell something at a very lucrative price, and attempts to direct a prospect buyer to a fake website impersonating the 'Gon. Needless to say, none of this will exist once a unsuspecting user has sent them the payment, neither the user nor the fake website.

As with any online shopping, like they say, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Hope this helps create a bit of much needed awareness about increasing scams on the good ol' 'Gon.
 
I haven't bought anything through them. But I believe it is best to check the seller's feedback rating before taking any decision or even initiating a negotiation. It is good to be sceptic about everything. But the problem is there seems to be quite a good number of items being sold by genuine people who do so for the first time.

Usually the price, joining date & feedback of the seller, the links & photos posted, their speed & accuracy of response to our queries, accepted payment methods can all raise suspicion in those who are precautious; it may not be so difficult to figure out if the seller is legitimate or not.

Audigon itself has a section on it:
Audiogon | Buyer Safety

I am not sure if sellers normally agree to it, but I think we can insist them to list the item on ebay and then transact?
 
The main problem is the extremely limited liability that the platform offers. In case of a fraud the site's responsibility is as little as to suspend the member. Nothing else.

3rd party payment options such as Paypal are useful. But even Paypal doesn't help all the time. A friend of mine got cheated a couple months ago. Luckily the amount was small. Paypal just said the user's account was hacked and washed its hands off the transaction.

Only case in which a Paypal payment is useful is when the payment is being made to a member with verified address as well as if a telephonic conversation has been done prior to making the payment that the account is secure with the member it belongs to.
 
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