Stolen goods sold on Ebay

I saw an article on the Today Show this morning about organized crime using eBay to fence stolen property. When I googled "ebay stolen property" I got pages of links to articles about people using eBay for this illegal purpose. Although I haven't really thought much about it before, it really didn't surprise me. eBay (like Craig's List and others) is built on trust, and overall it works. Less than 5% of merchandise sold on eBay is stolen.

It reminds me that unscrupulous people will always try to take advantage of a good thing and use it for their own purposes. After the tsunami disaster, someone used an email soliciting donations to disaster relief to send a computer worm. And after the gulf coast hurricanes, fake disaster relief sites popped up on the internet exploiting the kind generosity of strangers (see my article, Give Generously but Give Wisely).

I'm not a cynic, but I am cautious. Mostly, I'm angry and disappointed.