Spoof Email and Fake Web Site
28th August 2003

This spoof eBay email was distributed on 28th August 2003 and we also have images of the spoof web pages that it would have sent you to. These are just images of the originals, so there is absolutely no code included and none of the links or buttons will now work. The images shown have been reduced 80% of the original size.

The email hoax...

The email contains everything you'd expect to see in a genuine eBay email. You'll see that it contains a link to update your account information, but the link has been heavily disguised, and it would have taken you to the spoofed eBay web page.

From the images of the spoofed web site, you will see that the URL shown in the browser address bar is not as you would see if you went to eBay.com (the first part of the spoofed pages is "http://210.196.162.250/....."). In fact, the web site was hosted on servers located in Osaka, Japan.

The page that you arrive at from the link in the email is a web form which asks for your eBay AND Paypal user ID and passwords, Credit/Debit card details, Banking details, etc. Once the "Continue" button is pressed, you would arrive at the genuine eBay.com home page while the information given was sent to the scammer(s) by via an online form processing service.

and then the spoof web page, but notice the URL shown in the browser
address bar - this is not what you would expect to see with a genuine eBay page...

On pressing the submit button there, you would arrive at the genuine eBay.com home page while any information entered was relayed to the scammers, via an online form propcessing service.