The Silent Sales Machine Hiding On EBay
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Lets face it. Fraudulent Internet purchases is rampant, it is worse for non-tangible items and in total chaos for online game virtual item and ccount sales. To assume that there is not an abundance of scammers hacking paypal accounts and trolling the Internet looking for their prey would be a catastrophic error.
Sure, I have been victimized by these hungry villains in the past but to a much lesser extent today. I have learned much over the past 8+ years selling on ebay auctions and my web sites. My experiences have enabled me to construct a solid prevention plan. Its implementation has brought my wife and I outstanding results as sellers of Ultima Online gold and Resources, Eve Online ISK and World of Warcraft accounts and gold on ebay. We use that plan on our web sites as well. If you sell from a web site, auction site or just hit the trading boards you should find this information useful.
Establishing some kind of identity is our primary goal. If we can do that it will lay to rest many if not all of our concerns. Gather as much information as possible during the purchasing process. Informing the buyer what you may or may not do with this information will likely deter fraudsters from even completing the purchase. This will save you much time and grief down the road.
PayPals Seller Protection policy for Non-Tangible and virtual items is no good for us.
PayPal is awsome. We use PayPal exclusively as our payment gateway. They are safe, secure and cheaper to use than commercial bank accounts to accept credit cards. Sellers for the most part can feel safe because of Paypals Seller Protection policy. The problem for us as virtual / non-tangible item sellers is that we are NOT covered by this protection policy because we are not shipping an item and cannot provide proof of shipping. We are 100 of potential fraud. Do this if you do nothing else.
Match the Buyer's Address to their telephone number.
You can do this by performing a reverse lookup on the buyers phone number at bigfoot.com. Keep in mind that bigfoot's data is not always accurate and the address may not match it should at least get you in the proximity. If not then you may want to take additional steps for the confirmation. The phone type is not always accurate either. If you feel uneasy about the transaction and wish to be sure of the phone type then I recommend using maxmind.com, this is a paid service but it is worth every penny. They will also provide you with more detail pointing out the anonymous phone number types such as pay phones and store Purchased pre-paid cell phones ect. Do not accept an anonymous type if you are having doubts.
If the phone type is a land line and that address also matches the paypal confirmed shipping address then we are looking good. Make the call to be sure the phones owner is really purchasing from you. Calling also helps insure that a child is not attempting the purchase, If a child answer then ask to speak with an adult. We have busted many children attempting to hijack their parents paypal account or Credit card.
Cell phones may be acceptable depending on the situation and other provided information. We simply are not able to get enough info on cell phones to concrete any deal.
GEO IP lookup for web site owners
Capture the buyers IP address and perform a geographical lookup. Again I recommend using maxmind.com to do this. I have tried many other IP lookup web sites and have found maxmind to be the most accurate. The lookup should resolve to the proximity of the buyers confirmed address and/or phone number.
AOL IP's will not resolve properly, they use a funky proxy system and almost alwys resolve in the vicinity of Virginia. Maxmind will see through most other proxy systems and resolve properly. Use extreme caution if you do not get a proper match. In any case you should decline the purchase if it resolves to a different country.
Email verification. Ask the buyer to provide their Internet service provider email address
Do not rely solely on this. I do this only if I am still feeling uneasy after successfully performing all the above. Simply email the buyer and ask them to reply.
Free email providers such as hotmail, gmail, yahoo etc email addresses serve no purpose in regards to security. Don't bother doing this if it is all the buyer can provide you with.
Online ID Verification services
If all else fails then you are down to 2 choices. Reject the order or ask the buyer to register with an online ID verification service. For gamers I recommend using TrustWho.com otherwise try Verisign.com
To date we have not had a single report of fraud on my website RPGBids.com
Fraud on my wife's web site RPGloft.com is less than 0.05%.
I cannot say that these tips will guarantee anyone the same results but I can assure anyone who applies them that they will have very good results.
About the author:
Gene Souza and Wife have been selling Eve Online ISK & Ultima Online Gold MMORPG , and World of Warcraft gold & accounts MMORPG on their websites and ebay auctions for over 8 years. Fraud prevention for them is a fact of life. |
