Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Mounting an Online Posse

From: Marcel <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 23 Dec 2002 11:05:21 -0500

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/19/technology/circuits/19stin.html
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December 19, 2002

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Mounting an Online Posse
By KATIE HAFNER

OR two years, Jason Eric Smith, a 21-year-old sophomore at the University of New Orleans, had been finding good deals on used Macintosh computers and then reselling them on eBay.

Until a week before Thanksgiving, Mr. Smith's small enterprise ran smoothly, yielding just enough to pay the rent. Then a sale went terribly awry, leaving him a victim of a buyer's fraud. And in his outrage he persuaded fellow Mac users to take up his cause, turning themselves into sleuths armed with the Internet's power and reach.

The transaction had seemed routine enough. On Nov. 21, Mr. Smith shipped a new Apple Powerbook by FedEx to someone in Chicago who called himself Steve Matthews and told Mr. Smith in a phone conversation that he was buying the machine for a son in college.

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Two days later, Mr. Smith received a cashier's check for $3,052.78. He deposited it and withdrew cash, using it to pay his rent and to rent a car for a Thanksgiving trip. He also bought a new space heater for the apartment he shares with his girlfriend.

He returned from his trip to find a phone message from his bank saying that his account was in a deep hole. The cashier's check had bounced.

Eager to give his customer the benefit of the doubt, Mr. Smith called the same number he had used to reach Mr. Matthews a few days earlier. "In the back of my mind I was thinking the worst but hoping for the best," he recalled. The man who answered the phone sounded like Mr. Matthews. Yet he identified himself as Tony, a cousin of Mr. Matthews. He told Mr. Smith that his relative was away for Thanksgiving but that he would be glad to have Mr. Matthews call him back when he returned.

When no call came, Mr. Smith knew he had been a victim of fraud. The check was counterfeit.

Mr. Smith tried the usual methods of recourse. First he called the Chicago Police Department and was told it would be at least a week before a detective could get back to him.

He sent e-mail to eBay, asking for more detailed contact information for the buyer, whom he knew only by his eBay user name, videopro55, and the name Steve Matthews, evidently fictitious. In reply he received an automatically generated message expressing condolences and suggesting, among other things, that Mr. Smith save all correspondence with the purchaser.

The only phone number Mr. Smith had for the buyer was for a cellphone, and he was not sure how to connect it to a name and address. He called Nextel but was told that for privacy reasons, the carrier could not release any information about the subscriber.

Mr. Smith grew more determined.

A member of the relatively close-knit world of Macintosh users, Mr. Smith recounted his tale of loss at MacRumors.com and other electronic bulletin boards devoted to all things Macintosh.

"I'm out not only my computer," he wrote, "but also the $3,000 and now my finances are in complete disaster area since I had already spent a good deal of the money on Christmas shopping."

In response, Mr. Smith got some sympathy, along with some of the usual finger wagging. Some admonished Mr. Smith for his naïveté, for sending the computer cash on delivery and accepting a cashier's check. Had he never heard of PayPal?

Mr. Smith had in fact used PayPal, the online payment services company. But a trusting fellow by nature, he used C.O.D. and cashier's checks for most of his sales. To vet customers, he relies on eBay's feedback system, where users publicly attest to the trustworthiness of those with whom they have conducted business.

An habitué of MacRumors.com suggested that he use Cell Phone Magic, an online service that for an $85 fee could attach the cellphone to a name and street address. Not only did Mr. Smith get the address, but he even obtained a land-line number and a name: Melvin J. Christmas.

Mr. Smith called the number, and a man with a voice identical to that of "Steve" answered the phone. "I said, 'Look, I know how you are, you know who I am, I'm going to be straight with you - you can try and make good on this or I'm going to do everything I can to catch you,' " Mr. Smith said. "He listened to me and said he didn't know what I was talking about.''

Meanwhile, as clues and details were shared online, a few bulletin board participants said they thought that they, too, had been victims of Mr. Christmas. Some who lived in the Chicago area offered to go to Mr. Christmas's house and take justice into their own hands.

Then Mr. Smith decided to set up another auction in the hope of luring the purchaser back. If need be, he would fly to Chicago himself to confront Mr. Christmas when he took delivery of the package.

Using a different eBay account, Mr. Smith offered the same model of Powerbook, the G4 867. Within three hours, he had an offer from videopro55, but this time with a different mailing address.

Continued
1 | 2 | Next>>

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TRUSTING - Jason Eric Smith turned to fellow Mac users after receiving a bad check.

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