So in the process of selling my old laptop online I fell victim to a new internet/PayPal/CraigsList scam. Lucky me.
I put the laptop on Craigslist yesterday morning and within a few hours I had a buyer. He requested my PayPal information so I logged in and sent a request for funds to my PayPal account. The account was listed as “Pending”. Then a few minutes later I received an email (I thought was) from PayPal, saying the funds will be released into your account once we have a shipping / tracking number for Express delivery. So I walked down to the Post office, sent it next day ($80) to the address provided.
About an hour later I got a confirmation email saying the funds will be in your account within 12 hours.
This morning I was curious why the status hadn’t changed on my PayPal account yet then I received another email saying they overcharged the buyer by $800 and for me to Western Union over the money. Red Flag! What the fuck?! I still hadn’t received my initial $1000.
I then called PayPal and they said “Pending” means that the buyer handn’t even verified they got the email, let alone had $1000 in the PayPal account. Hell, they didn’t even have an account at all.
So now I’m out $80 and my old laptop, which was really worthless to me anyway. I was just hoping to get some cash for it or find a worthy friend/family member to give it to.
After a few informative emails and letting the buyer know I reported them to the Internet Crimes Division (ic3.org) and made a formal police report with all of the information I get an email back simply saying:
Come to Nigeria
MOTHER FUCKERS.