Has Anyone Else Got This Notice From Ebay? Cartel Related?

Unfortunately, I share a last name with you know who. Received this email Thursday March 4 from eBay.

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Notification of automatic deletion to help protect your personal data


Hi John,

We noticed that your eBay account has been inactive for an extended period of time. To protect your account and your personal data, we will close your account.
To prevent this, please sign into eBay within the next 30 days to keep your account active.
While you were out, we built the best global marketplace for buyers and sellers. eBay is better than ever. See for yourself.
Please note that we may be required to retain certain information (e.g. for compliance, tax, accounting or auditing purposes) for a limited period of time, after which it will be deleted. For more information on eBay's data storage & erasure policies and your rights as a data subject, please refer to our User Privacy Notice.

Email reference id: [##########]

We don't check this mailbox, so please don't reply to this message. If you have a question, go to Help & Contact.

eBay sent this message to John Ryle (theryles5jh0). Learn more about account protection. eBay is committed to your privacy. Learn more about our privacy notice and user agreement.

©1995#8204;-2021 eBay Inc., 2025 Hamilton Avenue, San Jose, CA 95125
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I have not sold on eBay for a couple years but am an active buyer.
The email address they used is NOT what is shown above but somehow it arrived in my in box. Conveniently, eBay says do not reply to their e box.

Any thoughts on what if any next step(s) I should take? Has anyone else received this or a similar email?

They used a different email address than any that you have ever had?

eBay does indeed close inactive accounts. But I certainly would not click on anything in the email but rather just logged into your account in your browser.
Don

Has all the earmarks of a phishing attempt. As mentioned above, do NOT click on any links in the email.

If you have been actively using your eBay account to buy, it doesn't matter how long it's been since you sold anything. eBay would NOT close your account.

I would delete the email.

I haven't sold on eBay in close to 20 years. I buy on eBay, though. It is not in their interest to shutdown buyers' accounts.

If they REALLY sent you such an e-mail, it would most likely be in your eBay account messages.

I recently received an e-mail 'from my ISP' telling me that they were going to shut down my account if I didn't log-in (link provided in e-mail) and update my personal info. As long as they are making money off of me, without interruption, why would they threaten such a thing???? What's in it for them? Besides, the links in the e-mail were to a website OTHER than my ISP. Phishers have simply come up with another approach. They need a success rate of 1 sucker per 1,000,000 'casts'. Don't be the 1.

Rev makes a good point; if you don't have the same message in your eBay email; clearly a phishing attempt.

I get the same sort of scam from Suntrust bank telling me my account is going to be closed. I don't have an account at that bank though.

You can contact eBay customer service, by phone, not on line, and they would be able to tell you if they sent it out. Customer service has full access to just about everything associated with you.

If a problem email, they would advise you they know about it or tell you were to safely send it to their attention.

NON Philatelic,

A Financial advisor I follow regularly,
Perhaps members would be interested in the latest Shenanigans.
Hope it is not out of context.

Hi Rodney,

After hours of crying, our baby finally dropped off to sleep in his mother's arms ...

… and then her phone rang.

The noise startled our son, and he began wailing.

"ANSWER IT!" she thundered at me.

I dived on her phone and shepherded it out of the bedroom.

"Hello?" I whined.

"A warrant has been issued for your arrest. Press 1 immediately", said the recorded message.

I was so sleep deprived that I complied, and was promptly transferred to a human.

"We have found a discarded rental car with 20 pounds of cocaine, fraudulent bank statements, and bloodstains on the seats — the car was rented in your name," announced the man on the end of the line.

"Who is this?" I yelled.

"My name is Richard Solman. I am an Australian Federal Police Officer. My badge number is 78291. Write that down. Your case number is 4859885. Write that down, too. You are potentially in a lot of trouble", he warned.

For the next few minutes our conversation reminded me of those I've had with my three-year-old when it suddenly dawns on her that her brothers are gone and she has my full undivided attention ... so she keeps the story going on, and on, and on, and on ...

Then Richard went in for the kill.

He reminded me that the call was being recorded, and then asked for my ID.

And after I'd given him my (fake) details, he announced that I'd been a victim of identity theft.

"How much money do you have in your main account, Mister Tape?" he asked.

"I have $13,823", I said precisely.

This got Richard audibly excited.

"I'm sorry to say that your accounts and your tax file number are compromised. All that money is at risk. We think it could be an inside job … a staff member from the ING bank", said Rich.

Next, he ordered me to get in my car, drive to my nearest bank branch and transfer my money into what he called a 'safe' AFP account for 48 hours … while they got to the bottom of the case.

And all the time I was thinking to myself, "Who would ever fall for this rubbish?"

The correct answer, of course, is "enough people to make it more than worth their while".

(Generally the most vulnerable people in our society — those with mental health issues and the elderly, who can be confused and intimidated. Last year Aussies lost $36 million from spam calls.)

Hold the phone! Here's my take:

Twenty-five years ago, the internet lowered the cost of sending spam emails to practically zero. And our inboxes got hammered. Well, for a while, that is, until email providers created spam filters to shield us from the 320 billion junk emails sent each day.

Yet the scammers have now doubled down.

Technology has now lowered the cost of calling to basically zero, and spoofing technology makes it look like they're calling you from a local number. Which explains why Richard and his mates are just so damn busy. They're making 500 million spam calls around the world each day.

Yet telcos are busy building the phone version of spam filters (with a nudge from the government). Telstra says it's blocking up to 500,000 spam calls a day.

My prediction?

Spam calls will soon be as rare as spam emails in your inbox.

Until then … if anyone rings you up with a warrant for your arrest, and asks about a discarded rental car with 20 pounds of cocaine, fraudulent bank statements, and bloodstains on the seats ...

Just press 1 … and tell them it was Mister Tape.

My wife and I both got the "arrest warrant" phone call last week. Our phones are set to silent for any #s the phone doesn't recognize so we just got voicemail. Why can't people work for a living anymore instead of trying to rip folks off?

There are only so many Congressional seats available.

My personal theory is that people that work very hard at being parasites on society think they are putting one over on all of us. Which, I suppose, they are. Like there is some intrinsic value in that. In the end, they will get caught - I cannot imagine doing this for a year or two and then leaving it behind. Once you've done it, it's easy to keep going. Unless, of course, one fails at THIS too - then maybe (purely for economic reasons) they move on to some other money-making venture, hopefully legal. I just hope the laws have enough teeth to make it hurt when they get caught.

I think that I have gotten the same sort of phone messages two or three times in the last year.

My thinking is: If some authority is going to arrest someone why would they warn that person in advance. So they can run away?

It's never going to end until the consequences of their actions outweigh the benefits. That will never happen through government intervention or the criminal justice system.

I just about spit my beer out laughing at this.

I think this was said by Will Rodgers, "Crime does pay. It just cost too much to get elected."