Scam Watch

[gumsyd]

Hello all,

please refer to below on how to protect yourself against common scams on the internet. This information is also under our Help pages under the safety tips section http://sydney.gumtree.com.au/p-SafetyTips;

* Brand name spoofing / phishing: You get an email that claims to be from Gumtree, eBay, Western Union, or another company and offers buyer protection or an online payment system or perhaps a cash prize. These emails will typically request that you send money or provide personal information. Any emails which combine urgency with some need for personal details should be treated with caution, no matter whom they purport to be from. Gumtree and most other companies will never send out such emails. If you send money via these sites you are likely sending money to the fraudsters. If you receive an email alleging to be from a company offering a service then go directly to the company’s official website and look for details of the service.

* Cheque overpayment: A buyer or seller or prospective tenant will send you a cheque worth more than the value of the items/ rent and then ask for the surplus money to be returned to them or a third party, for example “to pay for shipping”. The cheque will clear into your bank, only to be stopped/refused weeks later. At this point, the Banks/Building Societies will take the full cheque amount back out of your account. Not only will you have lost the goods, you will be out of pocket for the amount of the cheque and the amount you passed on as the difference.

* Payment for brokerage/importing: A seller claims that there are brokerage fees, import duties, or other such fees required to get an item into the country. Do not pay such fees, as you will most often never get the product and will have lost any money you paid. Again, Gumtree is designed for local, face to face trading.

* Fake escrow sites: A buyer or seller or prospective tenant/ landlord suggests using an escrow service to complete the transaction. Often these escrow web sites are run by fraudsters (even though they may look "official") and they will take your money and never send you the product.

* Work from home: Many work from home offers are "pyramid schemes" which require you to recruit other members in order to get paid. For example, an ad may say that you can make 100 an hour by stuffing envelopes. But to make that money, you need to sell the system to others. Other work from home opportunities are fronts for money laundering - key warning sign should be any 'job' that involves you receiving cheques and cashing them. For these reasons we typically don't accept work from home positions on Gumtree.

* 419 Scams: You get an email saying that your help is needed to take money out of a country and that you will be paid a commission for your help. Eventually they will ask you for money to help them take the large amount of money out of the country and once you pay you will never hear from them again.

* Pet Shipping Scams: A seller will claim to have a pet and will offer to ship them from an overseas location, or even get you to book seats on a plane! These are usually sought after dog breeds such as English Bulldogs, Yorkshire Terriers and Chihuahuas. These ads are usually accompanied by ‘staged’ pictures. The pets don't exist and the fraudsters simply try to get you to pay money upfront. Remember: be wary of overseas sellers.

Other good sources of information to read about common scams on the net are:

o Sites such as ---scamwatch.gov.au/content/index.phtml/tag/InternetScams to stay up to date on current internet scams.

o You can also learn about current scams from other Gumtree users in the Gumtree Forums.

How to report scams and fraud:

* If you see an ad on the Gumtree site that you suspect is Spam, illegal, or otherwise violates Gumtree's policies http://sydney.gumtree.com.au/p-Policies, please click on the links found under "Report this Ad" in the bottom right of the ad's page. Reporting ads brings the ad to our attention so that we will review and can take it down quickly if appropriate.

* You can also use the "Report illegal/infringing Ad" link on an ad's page to send an email to the Gumtree staff regarding a certain ad.

* If you reply to an ad and the person who posted the ad emails you with a suspicious request (eg. asks for money to be sent to them via a payment service), please forward us the email via this link http://sydney.gumtree.com.au/c-ContactUs and stop all communications with that person.

* If you are the victim of fraud, inform Gumtree and your local police service.

If you have any other security questions that aren't answered above, then please contact us via the contact us links though the help pages http://sydney.gumtree.com.au/c-ContactUs


Hopefully the information listed in our help pages and above will help you make an informed decision while dealing with a potentially fraudulent ads.

Please let us know if you have further questions or suggestions on improving Gumtree.

Thanks

The Gumtree team