Overview
The victim/seller expects to sell a product to an individual buyer on a third-party hosted platform, app, or website such as Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, eBay, Etsy, and many others.
How It Works
The scammer poses as a buyer on an online marketplace.
In this scam, the victim/seller ultimately does not receive payment for the product sold.
The scammer will instead try to initiate an overpayment scheme, or may insist that the victim sign up on a spoofed banking/payment website to get paid, or (especially in the case of car sales) may insist that the victim/seller pay for a fake vehicle 'verification' using a website which is really controlled by the scammer.
The Zelle or Paypal upgrade scheme is another variation, in which the scam buyer claims that the seller needs to upgrade their payment account on Zelle or Paypal to a higher tier in order to get paid for the item. In reality, the scammer controls the 'upgrade' website and steals the victim's banking information.
In a fake buyer scam, the scammer may also initiate complicated verification procedures such as texting numeric codes to the victim/seller under the guise that they are worried about scams.
With vehicle sales, fake buyers may insist that a seller purchase a vehicle condition report from a fraudulent platform controlled by the buyer.
Related Articles
Related Scams
2.2.5 OTP Or Phone Verification Scam: Some scam buyers will use the online marketplace purchase as the pretext to begin the OTP scam
2.2.10 Account Upgrade Scam: Some scam buyers will use the online marketplace purchase to launch the "account upgrade" scam, for example through a payment processor such as Zelle
Related Crime Schemes
A particular instance of this scam may embed one or more of these related schemes.
Data Loss: Any scheme that results in victim losing data/scammer stealing data. Data in this context can mean login credentials, credit card details, or other personal or corporate information.
Fraudulent Platform: Any scheme that relies on custom built software that assists the crime. Includes fraudulent trading platforms, fraudulent clickworking platforms, and the like.
Overpayment scheme: In an overpayment scheme, victims are told they have been given a large amount of money as part of the scam and are asked to refund a smaller amount back to the scammer. In reality, the initial overpayment does not exist.
Victim Targeting Context
The scammer may use one or more of the following techniques to reach the victim.
Targeted Conversation: The scammer approaches the victim through targeted, topical online conversation (related to the purchase of the item the victim has listed for sale)
Social Engineering: Psychological Manipulations
The scammer may use one or more of these psychological techniques to accomplish the scam.
Easy Money: The scammer promises easy money or makes appeals designed to leverage victim's greed.
Not A Scam: The scammer goes to great lengths to convince the victim the scheme is not a scam, or leverages the victim's prior scam awareness in some way.
Social Engineering: Impersonation Techniques
The scammer may impersonate one or more of the following groups as part of the scam.
Business or NonProfit: The scammer impersonates a business or nonprofit.
Catfishing: The scammer creates a fictitious online profile or persona.