In December, Messerschmidt, in his first online auction foray, submitted the winning bid for a Gateway desktop computer through City Auction. Law enforcement officials are hearing from a lot of people like Messerschmidt. The Federal Trade Commission says that online auction fraud tops its list of complaints. In the first six months of the year, the FTC received 6,000 complaints about cyberauction shenanigans, up from 300 just a year earlier. The biggest advantage the Internet offers to con artists is anonymity.
Miscreants can hide behind E-mail accounts and false names and addresses.
D.C. While auction sites say they empathize with users who have been defrauded, they cry caveat emptor when it comes to the bona fides of the seller. Nonetheless, any fraud is bad for business, and sites are working on ways to help safeguard consumers, such as rolling out insurance programs and strengthening user reputation rating systems. Last month, the Illinois attorney general sued two Chicagoans who peddled computer software and hardware on eBay and ZDNet. Early this year, investigators with the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs found several auctioneers were selling baseball paraphernalia that was not signed by baseball greats as advertised. Pirates of counterfeit goods also find the online trading posts handy outlets.