escow fraud of 3rd partner

[santahw050]

I want to ask any victim of the 3rdpartner scam or anyone who knows anyone has been scammed to contact me at santahw050@hotmail.com, so I can help all other victims recover as well. I have all the email correspondence with that phony escow company, and all the email correspondence with the buyer, who?s probably owner of that phony escow company. I have the emails stored in my hotmail account and another email account for safety reason. I still have the address where the buyer asked me to ship the items to, and I have the buyer?s ebay ID. If you need any further info., please don?t hesitate to email me at santahw050@hotmail.com. Anyone who has information that ultimately leads to recovery of my money; I will give 20% of my money recovered as a reward. You have my words.


On March 7th, 2006, I was contacted by a person alleged to be Crilov Alexandru, ebay user colonelrob1865, with an email address of crilov01@yahoo.com, inquiring about a possible sale of one Authent GMT Dig date Ulysee Nardin gold watch. I told him about the price of the watch, and offered to sell him another watch, one Rolex gold. We have some email exchange, and I agreed to sell him two watches for $ 19,600 USD. He agreed to buy the item for the asking price and recommended a company called 3rd Partner to me. He claimed to me that he has used that company before and talked about it very highly.

I checked the website, and I saw that it was registered in two countries, and was approved by the Department of Corporations at Belgium, and that it accepts Visa, Master and paypal, I did not suspect that it was a phony escow because I did not know that fraudsters nowadays can be so technological advance. On March 8th, I registered on http://www.3rdpart.net, an alleged escow company.

We then set-up the transaction, he was under the username bluefire, and I was under the username santahw050:

The transaction detail was as follow:

Transaction ID: 1257133616

The transaction was started by bluefire, and the other party was I, santahw050.

The items involved in the transactions were:
Authent GMT Dig date Ulysee Nardin 18k GOLD WATCH 18 k ebay Item number: 8911791206 plus Authent Rolex Oyster Datejust 18k GOLD WATCH w/ diamond ebay Item number: 8911787005.

The price was 19,600.00 USD.

The escow fee allegedly paid by bluefire was $137.20 USD.

I shipped the two watches with DHL on March 16, 2006, and the DHL waybill number was 7313485756. Bluefire received the watches on March 22, 2006.

The shipping address was Crilov Alexandru, Str. Teatrala, Nr. 12, Chisinau, MD, Zip Code: 32000, Moldova.

On March 23, 2006, I received an email from the alleged Customer Support of 3rd Partner that I will be paid in 7 to 10 business days.

I urged 3rd Partner on four occasions to have them pay me the $ 19,600 USD owed without success. I suspect there was fraudulent activity involved. On April 6th, 2006, I paid a researcher on google answer to run a background check on 3rd Partner, and found out that that company was no registered either in New York or in Belgium.

I ran a search on http://www.allwhois.com/. I also found out that 3rdpart.net was registered by an individual alleged to be Amanda Bompensa living at 439 North Lafayette Ave .in Morrisville, Pennsylvania. The domain name was registered on 4 March 2006. And the domain name will be expired in one year.

I run a phone number check with the phone company and found out that 3rd Partner does not have any office at 350 Fifth Avenue, 10118, New York (the alleged business address of 3rd Partner). I found out that I was defrauded and I contact Internet Crime Centre right away.

In my opinion, it is highly possible that either Crilov Alexandru owned 3rd Partner or friends of Crilov Alexandru owns it.

[Grachtenhamster]

"...because I did not know that fraudsters nowadays can be so technological advance."

Sorry for being so frank and straight away - but you have to learn a lot about modern IT technology. And about scamming too...!

Forget the registration details of the domain, most probably stolen or lost ID document has been used. And in the same wallet there surely was a credit card which the scammers used to pay the domain registration and the webhosting.

Most of the adresses shown in fake escrows are existing, but one finds there anything except the "company" in question.

"In my opinion, it is highly possible that either Crilov Alexandru owned 3rd Partner or friends of Crilov Alexandru owns it."

Own? There is nothing to own, because there was never a company called "3rd Partner"! There was only a website, nothing more. The same website for sure today is using another phantasy name and is hosted on another server, if one site is closed the scammers open 3 new ones! In the last 3 years or so there had been more than 1000!

Forget the names. Typical Romanian names, either completely false, or based on falsified ID document.

Shipping address in Moldavia? Sorry to say, but latest here all alarm bells should have started to ring. Normally the scammers are more intelligent, they use adresses in Italy, Spain, or other European countries, which look much more reliable. They are either completely wrong and based on falsified ID documents, or again stolen documents are used. Shipment normally is not delivered to these adresses, the scammers follow up the shipment by online tracking, and appear at the courier service point in the very early morning to pick up the parcel before delivery vans are loaded. They use the falsified resp. stolen IDs to claim delivery.

The sending IPs of the e-mails you have are worthless. Either they used a proxy, or a neutral webmail server, or the IPs route to Romania.

You have to be aware that you had not been scammed by 1 or 2 individuals, but by organized crime. And there is no way either to get your watch back nor to identify the scammers! Sorry, but these are the facts.

[Marie la Belge]

Whois search, Google search, phone number check....
WHY didn't you run those searches BEFORE shipping ?????

[peg]

And why did you "PAY" a researcher to investigate the company. There are several sites similar to this one that would be just happy to verify the validity of a site. If they are not valid, then they get added to our databases to help warn others.

Alas, I know it's a painful lesson. One that I too had to learn several years ago.

As for your chances of catching them, I think its unlikely but don't wish to discourage your attempt. Anything I (or people at this site) can do to help let us know. I am sure many would be willing to help to stop these people anyway they can.

Good luck with your search and I hope you can stop them. Let us konw your results.

[santahw050]

Hi everyone,

Thanks for everyone's support. I don't know what to say except thank you. I just want to ask for everyone's help. I wish I could have known of this site earlier.

First, if anyone get contact by anyone that recommend the use of a company called Third Partner, please let me know, and I will follow up on possible leads.

Second, I want to know do anyone of you know how to send a "sucker" email to trick the criminals at third partner to volunteer their address or other personal information.

Third, if anyone know of any possible vicitims or have been victimize, please let me know. I received possible leads that the fraudlent activity have something to do with using domain names at XO communications by some Romanians. If anyone know anything about it, please let me know.

Also I got a tip from a person who almost got rip off by 3rd Partner about another fraudent activity of that 3rd Partner. Go to the website snuffelcorner.nl, and in the search engine, type in mustang cobra 1966, and you will find the listing. The alleged seller was Oliver Ballak, but that's just an alias. I wanted to contact him and trick him into giving more info., but I don't speak that language and it won't be smart to contact that scammer in english, because the listing wasn't in english. If anyone that's willing to help please email me at santahw050@hotmail.com

[JaxHot]

First, if anyone get contact by anyone that recommend the use of a company called Third Partner, please let me know, and I will follow up on possible leads.

Go to the eBay message boards for escrow and insurance and do a search for other victims.

Second, I want to know do anyone of you know how to send a "sucker" email to trick the criminals at third partner to volunteer their address or other personal information.

Won't happen. They're stupid but not THAT stupid.

[Grachtenhamster]

@ santahw050

You should realize that these are no simple script kiddies, but you had to do with organized crime!

"I want to know do anyone of you know how to send a "sucker" email to trick the criminals at third partner to volunteer their address or other personal information."

"The alleged seller was Oliver Ballak, but that's just an alias. I wanted to contact him and trick him into giving more info."

Stop dreaming!

And who the hell voted here for "yes"...??

[suziecue]

What was ICC's opinion on the likelihood of apprehending the scammers?

This is not something you should even consider trying to do independently. These are technically advanced criminals who operate internationally with impunity.

[JaxHot]

What was ICC's opinion on the likelihood of apprehending the scammers?

This is not something you should even consider trying to do independently. These are technically advanced criminals who operate internationally with impunity.

They are NOT technologically advanced.

[suziecue]

They are NOT technologically advanced.

Some are, some aren't.

Escrow fraudsters are a a lot more advanced than Advance Fee Fraud fake banks, for example, but not as advanced as the folks behind bot-spawned phishing sites.

None of them are gangs that I would like to take on uninformed, non-anonymously, and so on.