Quote:
Originally Posted by lolo1972sg
Long term Trusted sellers or not, their accounts can still be hacked and be used in scams. This has become prevalent.
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This is an easy situation to overcome. In most cases, hacked accounts (especially of an active "trusted" seller) have a VERY limited time span for the scammers to work in (and they know it) so they will almost always put the contact info right in the ad (usually not obscured or coded like johnsmith AT whatevs.com). If the ad's price looks too good to be true or even better than average, just search the sellers older ads and compare contact info. ANY discrepancy is an immediate red flag. Many times the scammers will start a VERY similar looking email address. For example, say the trusted sellers real email is "Watch58xl@gmail.com". The scammers will use "Watch58x1@gmail.com". If you're not paying close attention, it's easy to miss. Also pay attention to the ad style. Most people tend to advertise is a similar manner with similar syntax/writing style.
Even for private sellers, again, if you're even a little suspicious, just search for the seller's older ads and compare contact info, ad styles, etc. If I'm suspicious, I will use the seller's contact info from the OLD sales ad. Or cross check the forums. A lot of people are on the various watch sites under the same user name/email address/contact number/etc.