I wish I knew what's going on behind the scenes at eBay when I get these messages...

[Doc]

I bought an item a month ago. Paid promptly with PayPal. Received the item about a week later. No problem with the transaction.

The item is fine. So far as I can tell, it's not a counterfeit.

The seller had almost 4,000 sales and 99.5% positive feedback.

Today I received this message from eBay:

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MC015 Security notice: eBay listing removed
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Hello -- (--@--.com),

We're writing to let you know that we removed the listing for the following item that you won or bid on:

--

To help protect you, we removed this listing so we can confirm that the seller is not putting you or other eBay members at risk.

If you've already paid for this item through eBay, you can open a case in our Resolution Center to get your money back. All you need to do is click the link below, and select the "I haven't received it yet" option. This will guide you through the process to get a refund. (Unfortunately, because we removed the listing, you won't be able to look up the seller's contact information.)

[Link]

If you won the item but haven't paid yet, don't pay for it.

If the seller offers you the item outside of eBay, we strongly encourage you to not accept the offer. These types of transactions are extremely risky and are not covered by eBay buyer protection programs.

If you didn't pay through eBay, please read the following information:

-- If you paid by Western Union or MoneyGram, contact the company directly (Western Union 800-325-6000 or MoneyGram 800-926-9400).
-- If you paid by check, contact your bank to stop payment.
-- If you paid by credit card, contact your credit card company to dispute the charge.

We want to make sure you get your money back safely and quickly.

Thanks,

eBay

It's not a spoof email. The headers are correct. There's an additional copy in my Message Center in-box. They correctly identified the item.

The listing has vanished. The seller no longer comes up on a search, but the link is still there on my feedback page where I find that he's "no longer a registered user."

Every listing that he had is now "removed or not available."

This has happened twice in the last month with different sellers.

I suspect that somebody hijacked the seller's account, made a bunch of fraudulent listings and was caught.

I'd like to know the real story.

[(vikm)]

What I (and everyone else, probably) want to know is what did you buy ;-)

[Doc]

(vikm) wrote:
What I (and everyone else, probably) want to know is what did you buy ;-)

A DVD box set for a popular tv show.

[Carnos Jax]

I've had something like this happen to me last year. I sold a new in the box Sony bluray player and in the listing I used some if Sony'a marketing info (cut and pasted from their website, though with no hot links). After I shipped the item to the buyer, eBay sent me an email canceling the listing. The best part is that my final value fees were refunded! But my account was otherwise unaffected.