Ebay to eliminate winning bidder IDs

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Posted By: Marc S.

Well -- this can only further increase the probability that sellers can shill their auctions....since winning bidders will not be apparent, and there is a clear incentive to do so. It's almost an easy way for infrequent sellers to run around the reserve auction prices by simply shilling up to what the reserve might have been.

Gotta love Ebay and all their tinkering.



October 28, 2008

Making Winning Bidder IDs Anonymous

Early last year, we began to anonymize bidder IDs on listings. This change was designed to protect bidders from fake Second Chance Offers and other malicious emails. As I’ve shared before, this initiative has been very successful, resulting in a 90% reduction in this type of fraud.

Today, however, the winning bidder’s ID is currently visible to everyone after the listing ends, and this continues to lead to fake checkout offers and other spam. Consequently, it also leads to unpaid items, as winning bidders who fall victim to these fake emails often send payment to someone other than the seller.

Based on the positive results we’ve seen by anonymizing bidder User IDs, as well as our commitment to protecting all bidders from becoming targets for fraudsters, we’ve decided to extend anonymized User IDs to winning bidders, as well. This change will be implemented sometime this week.

As always, the following information will still be accessible:


Sellers will be able to view all bidder IDs on their listings.
All members can click on the bidder ID and view the bidder’s Bid History page, which will detail the categories in which they’ve bid over the past 30 days.
Feedback pages will show the same information as now – buyer and seller IDs, with comments visible to all.
Thanks for taking the time to read about these updates to improve safety on eBay, and we thank you for your support.

Sincerely,


John Canfield
Senior Director, eBay Trust & Safety

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Posted By: Matt

Incredible.

Some time ago, a few members here were contacted to have some direct communication with eBay regarding vintage cards; perhaps they could convey the rational reasons why this change is not in eBay's best interests?

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Posted By: Sean C

or is eBay running out of toe to shoot off?

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Posted By: Max Weder

Dumb dumb move by a company that has lost touch with what made it successful

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Posted By: Scott Levy

I know that the whole stock market has suffered significant declines over the past year, but when a stock (ebay) goes from 36 to 15 over the course of a year, it says that people don't believe that management will take the right steps to grow the company in the future - and I couldn't agree more.

I just wish there were other online alternatives (BST being the only real one)for vintage card buying/selling.

-SGL

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Posted By: Eric B

I understand what they are trying to eliminate - the scamming of the winners. But this is overkill - they could just delay the winning bidder ID from showing for a couple days and still accomplish the same thing.

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Posted By: Robert Klevens

I often use Yahoo Japan and their auctions only show the winner if you participate in the auction otherwise the ID is mostly blocked out like big***

Also you have the option to extend your auctions if bids are received in the final 5 minutes.

You can set a "Buy it Now" price but unlike Ebay, the "Buy it Now" stays even if there is a bid.

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Posted By: Matt

"show the winner if you participate in the auction"

that makes way too much sense for them to do here.

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Posted By: quan

you guys keep forgetting ebay is trying to move from an auction-based site to an online retailer, so this is just another step in that direction. it sucks but not surprising.

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Posted By: Scott Levy

Matt & Quan,

Very good points there is a lot of truth to both statements.
-SGL

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Posted By: Mac Wubben

It seems like a very simple question...do people care more about the integrity and transparency of an auction or possible protection from scammers. For some reason ebay decides that it's in their best interested to protect the fools at the expense of everyone else. I am still upset that they removed bidding ids, now they are going to remove the only protection left? Don't they understand that transparency is what makes the whole thing work? I might be able to accept the change if it actually made them more money...but it seems like pure stupidity and lack of understanding of why people like ebay. There are tons of places to go if I want to buy at inflated prices and bid against shillers...why make yourself just like them?

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Posted By: D. Bergin

Forget about shilling.............as an honest seller I noticed much higher realized prices on many of the types of items I deal with when all of the bidders ID's were able to be viewed.

It seems when the same people collect similar items there's more of a chance to be a bidding war when you know who you're going up against.

A lot of bidders who valued their privacy probably weren't too thrilled about this but there was definitely a culture of collectors who tracked what their competition were bidding on and bid accordingly.

Of course the rise in popularity of sniping programs also contributed to this but the lack of transparency in Ebay auctions have also caused buyers to be more conservative and suspicious in their bidding IMO.

From the selfish standpoint of a seller I wish they would go back to showing all bidding ID's.

I don't think that will ever happen as Ebay continues to chop it's own nose off over and over in order to spite it's own existence and anybody who still deals with them.

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Posted By: jay wolt

What can be gained (in eBay's point of view) to hide the
wining bidders ID?
Many of their recent moves I do not like, like the 5 star rating
& removal of negative feedback towards a buyer.
But I can see whay they would implement it.
But why would they want to eliminate the buyers winning ID from sight?
And if you do a search via feedback, is that info gone from what the
buyer has won?

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Posted By: Richard Dwyer

"Sincerely,

John Canfield
Senior Director, eBay Trust & Safety"

Stealing a network54 member's name. Can't go any lower.

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Posted By: boxingcardman

The overarching theory of every change is to make the site into a direct competitor of Amazon. I see this as just another part of the push away from the auction format, the thinking being that if Ebay piles on unpalatable changes in the auction format it will depress auction prices and action to the point where sellers will move to price everything on a BIN basis, perhaps using the best offer mechanism as a means of putting a negotiation component into play.

I happen to think it is a stupid idea, abandoning the marketing tool that got you on the map to try and step into a market niche that is already occupied by a monster competitor, but that is the folly of the Board.

Sic Gorgiamus Allos Subjectatos Nunc

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Posted By: Bob C

I have mixed feelings about this. My overall reaction is negative for obvious reasons, mostly listed above. That said, I recently won an Ebay auction and in addition to the winning bidder notification I received the following email:

I'm the seller of the item that you have recently bid through the eBay system.Item number:XXXXXXXXXXXX <- MY EDIT
I have to congratulate for your winning bid.Regretfully, immediately after the listing closed I got an email from Paypal and I must advise you that my account has been compromised immediately and my account is locked.So please reply me asap at jimmajda1978@gmail.com so we can clarify this situation

Thank you!

A quick comparisison of this email address to the sellers email address in the winning bid notification showed they were not the same. I contacted the seller and he verified the above email was not sent by him.
I did not even bother contacting eBay. I did, however, send an email to this fool suggesting he do what Mr. Bush is wanting to do to that Olympic volleyballer in my avatar, only in a much more vulgar manner.

I do not think Ebay is making the correct decision here. It is the end of Ebay as we know it...they are taking every step to prevent us from connecting with other collectors. Soon the ID of the person you sell to won't be visible to the seller or you won't be able to get their actual email even when you sell to them.

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Posted By: Dan P.

In a related event, I had been selling on ebay since late 2000. They caught up with me this past Monday (10/27) as far as my accepting paypal only. I have no plan to accept paypal or any credit card as payment. Any of you folks have any alternates for me to use until ebay allows sellers to accept checks and money orders again? (Please list web addresses if possible)

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Posted By: MVSNYC

i can't even deal with eaBy's format these days...i haven't bought anything in a while on there...it's so different then in the past. why couldn't they keep it simple (the K.I.S.S. theory). navigating on their auction pages is ridiculous, the size of most pictures suck, etc.

companies (whether it's porsche, GE, eBay, etc), always "think" they have to change the design of their products every year to keep it fresh and new, BUT, if it ain't broke, don't try to fix it!


edited to add: and selling with them? forget it, they've made it so complicated...

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Posted By: Matt

Don't have any experience with it, but a friend introduced me to bonanzle.com yesterday.