Paypal fraud

Just this morning I see this bogus message saying I bought something and to contact them to cancel. Just delete and move on.

scam.jpg
 
Sometimes Paypal is a necessary evil.

But as others have stated unless YOU do something, it is difficult to be scammed. And I have about seen them all.

So what some clown scammer tries a request? Nothing going to happen if you just delete it.

Almost, well like 99% of the time - somehow the scammer has your password. How did that happen?

I've seen some garbage from buyers (after goods ship) with the whole didn't authorize the charge and it came out of the wrong account noise and then the chargeback hits...............****ed ripoffs.........Paypal is no dman good at protecting sellers, and they now dropped their cc protection screen. Interesting that.

Yeah. I'm done with them and their stock price shows it.
 
Okay, gang, got another phishing attempt today. Here's how this one looked as an e-mail. I went to my PayPal account by typing PayPal.com in my browser and not following any link here, and confirmed that this clown sent a payment request. There seems to be no way automatic billing can happen unless you call that number and give them your password and other info. I cancelled the payment request, of course.

Notice all the misspellings. This was sent by someone not entirely fluent in English, and "Charlotte Robbins" is obviously not likely to be the real name. I didn't recognize it. Yet the name was identified as "trusted", ha ha.

Take a good look so you don't fall for this.

Charlotte Rollins sent you a money request
NOTE FROM Charlotte Rollins:
quote
We have detected some fraudulently activities with your PayPal account. If you did not make this transaction, please call us as soon as possible at toll free number +1(888) 975-4270 . to cancel and claim a refund. If this is not the case, you will be charged $699. 99 today. Within the automated deduction of the amount, this transaction will reflect on PayPal activity after 24 hours. Our Service Hours: (06:00 a. m. to 06:00 p. m. Pacific Time, Monday through Friday)
quote
Payment request details
Transaction ID
[deleted by me]
Transaction date
November 30, 2022
Amount requested
$699.99 USD​

PayPal


PayPal is committed to preventing fraudulent emails. Emails from PayPal will always contain your full name.
Please don't reply to this email. To get in touch with us, click
Not sure why you received this email?

Copyright © 1999-2022 PayPal, Inc. All rights reserved. PayPal is located at 2211 N. First St., San Jose, CA 95131.
PayPal [serial numbers deleted]
ts
[All links within e-mail deleted]
 
I work as a cybersecurity analyst in a large organization and part of my job is triaging the phishing emails that come in. So I feel that I have a pretty good finger on what's hot and what's not with phishing scams and other frauds delivered via email.

I can definitely confirm an uptick in Paypal fraud attempts. What's changed is that the emails are coming from Paypal themselves. It used to be folks would just spoof the paypal address but if you looked at the delivery headers the email didn't come from Paypal. Now, people are creating a lot more bogus Paypal accounts and the emails come from the legit Paypal email servers. My general impression is that Paypal needs to further secure their account signup process so that this stuff happens less.

If it were up to me I would block all financial tech sites at work, banks, paypal, venmo, zelle, cashapp, whatever. The agency does not pay for stuff using those sources, we issue purchase orders and generate checks after we receive and verify the (paper) invoices. I don't need or want users getting themselves scammed at work, they can do that on their own time.

But it's not up to me so we allow folks to use their work email addresses to sign up for Paypal and other fintech things.
 
Here's one of the several of these we have gotten reported to the security operations center team today, of course, the 800 number is NOT paypal but rather some call center in India or Cambodia, two places that people are forced into servitude scamming people.

We have detected some fraudulently activities with your PayPal account. If you did not make this transaction, please call us as soon as possible at toll free number+1 (800 number redacted) . to cancel and claim a refund. If this is not the case, you will be charged $699. 99 today. Within the automated deduction of the amount, this transaction will reflect on PayPal activity after 24 hours. Our Service Hours: (06:00 a. m. to 06:00 p. m. Pacific Time, Monday through Friday)

Because these come from the actual Paypal email server with the actual payments address, we have to work harder to find these ones on the email server to hard delete them. The fraud ones are mixed in with hundreds of legit ones and they mostly all have the same subjects.
 
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And if you weren't aware that people were being forced to work in cyber scamming, read this article. Apparently it is a more profitable criminal venture to traffic people into cyber crime than it is to force them into sex slavery.

 
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That’s why I checked the real phone number on paypal.com and it matched the one on the email. That’s the number I called and got the scammers.
 
A credit card.
I've had 3 credit cards hacked in the last 1-1/2 years, but have never had my PayPal account hacked. Of course I'm not responsible for the credit card fraud, but it's a hassle to go through every time. And I really don't use my credit very much, and it's only stored on-line at 3 different places like Amazon, eBay, etc ... big sellers who you'd think would have a secure website. I've bought things on-line from AliExpress (China), using PayPal ... there is absolutely NO WAY I'm going to store my credit card number on that website.
 
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That’s why I checked the real phone number on paypal.com and it matched the one on the email. That’s the number I called and got the scammers.
Number spoofing? Was there any way to verify you were actually talking to someone at PayPal when you called?

Did you actually talk to scammers if you called the same phone number listed on PayPal's official website? I don't see how that would be possible.
 
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With the fragility of the banking system and how easy it is to get hacked and subsequently locked out of your money these days, I like to maintain multiple discrete ways to pay if needed. I have had paypal for at least 20 years. Its convenient for online purchases somewhere I may never buy from again. I have Venmo also but that one seems far sketchier to me.
 
I just got one of these apparently from PayPal LLC. Why would PayPal be sending me an invoice? hmmm... So I right-clicked on it, selected "Forward as attachment" and sent it to [email protected]. We shall see what happens.

No reference to this in my actual PP account.

paypal-request382.jpg
 
Never answer, never click, never call anything in an email. It's that simple. Heck, I dont even open those kinds of emails, if I see one I delete it.
Log into your account on your own, make sure nothing has been charged on your account and if you need to feel better change your password.
If you need to contact customer service, get the phone number from your online account or look it up on the official website.

Perfect example posted above my post. Look at it this way. If someone called you on the phone and said you owe me $382.00 and what is your credit card number would you give it to them? Answer = no
 
No worry I did not fully open the email nor did I click on any link. I just sent the whole thing to "[email protected]".



What is odd is when I hover the mouse pointer over the "View and Pay Invoice" it shows below what appears as a legit PayPal address. But I also noticed a mis-spelled word "accepeted" a tell-tale sign that it is bogus. And another typo, an extra space in the "charged $382. 00"between the period and 00.




paypal-requestlink.jpg
 
I had two fraudulent money request on my Paypal account in the last two weeks. I get an email saying to call the number within 24 hours. I get a lot of fake Paypal emails so I logged in to my account and the fraudulent request in on my profile. I called the number and it took forever to get through. It kept disconnecting on me. I talked to ” Bob” in India and he noted the fraud and told me to change my password. I did all that and another $500 fraudulent request showed up today. I called the number and it sounded like some guy was sitting on his couch in Mumbai watching TV and answering the phone. For a large financial company, you would think they would have a more professional customer service call center. He said he will set up a two step log in to block the fraud. I already have to put a code in that they send me every time I log in. I use Payal for most of my online transactions because they always claim their security over just using a credit card. These two fraudulent transactions and calling Mumbai, Kentucky just doesn’t sit right with me. I think I will close my account with them. What’s your take on Paypal?
I use eBay with PayPal as little as possible. I just bought a $10 gasket on eBay and paid with PayPal. First use in 6 months.

With the built in consumer protections required by US law they are always your best bet.
Here's one of the several of these we have gotten reported to the security operations center team today, of course, the 800 number is NOT paypal but rather some call center in India or Cambodia, two places that people are forced into servitude scamming people.

We have detected some fraudulently activities with your PayPal account. If you did not make this transaction, please call us as soon as possible at toll free number+1 (800 number redacted) . to cancel and claim a refund. If this is not the case, you will be charged $699. 99 today. Within the automated deduction of the amount, this transaction will reflect on PayPal activity after 24 hours. Our Service Hours: (06:00 a. m. to 06:00 p. m. Pacific Time, Monday through Friday)

Because these come from the actual Paypal email server with the actual payments address, we have to work harder to find these ones on the email server to hard delete them. The fraud ones are mixed in with hundreds of legit ones and they mostly all have the same subjects.
What would happen if you did nothing? Just because someone sends you a payment request does not mean PayPal will do anything without you taking some action to approve it.
 
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