I was in banking, primarily audit and control, for over twenty years. There was and still is a principle in auditing and control that goes something like: "IF SOMEONE WANTS TO BAD ENOUGH AND TRIES HARD ENOUGH, THERE'S NOTHING YOU CAN DO TO STOP HIM".
You can make it extremely difficult and run-off 99.99% of the vermin, but there's always one that'll get through.
LIMIT YOUR EXPOSURE!!!
READ the fine print and UNDERSTAND the limitations of each payment method. The "fine print" will vary by payment type, issuer, and seller.
I once saw a case where somebody got conned in to paying $3,000 for six bags of washers, thinking they were quarters. There, wre quaters, two per roll,
fifty rolls per bag. Everything was right - the canvas bags, the weight, the seals, etc! EXCEPT THE GUY GOT CONNED OUT OF $2,850.
Another one that hasn't cropped-up on any of the web sites is altered financial instruments. A con artist would get a cashier's check or certified check for $25 and raise it to $25,000! Vehicle dealers, boat dealers and jewelers were the prime "pigeons" for this one.
Anything can be counterfeit or bogus. EVEN RIGS! When Rockwell-Collins stopped producing the KWM- and HF-380's, they dumped literally tons of surplus components on the market. Scammers had a field day (FIELD YEARS ) assembling -380's out of the surplus. Of course, the internal operating programs didn't match the installed options, but, hey, it was a "-380"!
And look at all of the [b]"replica" [/b] name plates floating around, especially for military sets. Is that "Collins" or "Motorola" -390A really an EAC?
There's a motto for fighter pilots that goes "ETERNAL VIGILANCE OR ETERNAL REST!"
For on-line trading it should be "ETERNAL VIGILANCE OR ETERNAL REGRET"!
Jerry
N9LCD
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