So someone is stealing my work.

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KenB259

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Dec 24, 2017
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Went online just looking for segmented pens. What pops up but one of my own. Someone took a screenshot of my Etsy page and is trying to sell my pen, for a very cheap price I might add. I still have the pen. I'm betting it's a site to steal credit card information. I dont know if there is anything I can do. The contact link on that site doesn't work. Here is a screenshot of the site.
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KenB259

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Did some more research and that site is indeed a scam site. My pen is prominently on their home page. None of the contact links work for me.
 

duncsuss

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Jun 29, 2012
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Wilmington, MA
Sometimes you can get information about a site by doing a WHOIS lookup. Here's what the GoDaddy WHOIS function returned. You might get a response if you email the Registrar at abuse@netim.net (although the phone number for the Registrar is in France.)

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johnjohnson42

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May 1, 2017
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Weddington NC
Happened to me as well... someone sent me an Etsy message telling me that she had purchased my pen through https://pakkajobsb.com (website seems to have been taken down now). She only knew it was one of mine because of the watermark I put in every one of my Etsy photos. Not only did the website have a lot of my pens listed for sale, they had several from other pen makers. Long story short... she reported it as fraud, PayPal refunded her the money and she ended up buying the pen from me.
 

penicillin

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Feb 27, 2019
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[...] Long story short... she reported it as fraud, PayPal refunded her the money and she ended up buying the pen from me.
Short story long:

... and the scam artist kept the money. They are bragging about it to their friends in some far away country that cares not a whit if their people steal from ordinary hardworking folks like us in the US and other countries.

... and we all pay more in PayPal fees, higher prices, etc. because it is cheaper to pay off @KenB259's defrauded customer and others like her rather than develop the necessary tools to fix the problem. It is especially true when enough defrauded PayPal customers don't bother to go through the refund process. That is pure profit for PayPal, who kept the fees and never had to pay many defrauded customers.
 
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Dec 22, 2017
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Wolf Creek Montana
I had someone try to steal my business/website name but go daddy caught it immediately. They added the word "Custom" (wolf Creek custom knives) and tried to sell on their website. I guess it didn't work so they went to Facebook. I get emails from some of their pi$$34 off customers complaining about their knives they bought. I don't think they're around anymore.
 

Penchant 4

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Jun 23, 2018
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Great Lakes Area
Happened to me as well... someone sent me an Etsy message telling me that she had purchased my pen through https://pakkajobsb.com (website seems to have been taken down now). She only knew it was one of mine because of the watermark I put in every one of my Etsy photos. Not only did the website have a lot of my pens listed for sale, they had several from other pen makers. Long story short... she reported it as fraud, PayPal refunded her the money and she ended up buying the pen from me.
An excellent argument for watermarking every product photo. Lots (apparently) of other protection steps; but not technically savvy enough to understand most of them.
 

montmill

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Jan 26, 2008
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13528 Old Hwy. G Montfort, Wisconsin
No sorry, didn't mean to imply that. It can happen to anyone but the point I was trying to make is we need to protect ourselves as best we can. We like to blame far off countries for all our troubles but they're right here in our own back yard too.
 

CjG78

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Feb 2, 2020
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Australia
I hate the mentality of some people. Trying to steal someone's hard earned creation is plain awful. Sorry to read this. Threaten them with legal action perhaps, put some fear into them. Mongrels.
 

johnjohnson42

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May 1, 2017
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Location
Weddington NC
Unfortunately there's probably nothing that can be done... if one of these websites manages to get shut down, ten more take their place. These are more than likely not some 14 year old kid in their mommy's basement... but an actual business overseas with hundreds of employees that get paid (and likely a commission) for setting up these scam websites. Their government isn't about to do anything about them, and our government is too inept to do anything about it... so be careful out there guys... scammers are everywhere.
 

penicillin

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Feb 27, 2019
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I hate the mentality of some people. Trying to steal someone's hard earned creation is plain awful. Sorry to read this. Threaten them with legal action perhaps, put some fear into them. Mongrels.
Sounds wonderful. Good luck finding the culprit so you can get to step 2.

(Based on some small experience: Even if you can definitively identify the culprit with absolute, provable certainty, acting on that information is generally impossible because most of the time the culprit is in a jurisdiction that will not cooperate. In fact, the authorities may be actively supporting the culprit.)
 

sorcerertd

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Sep 30, 2019
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North Carolina, USA
It's interesting that Etsy suggests not using watermarks because of Google advertising and "Etsy Finds" emails. Article here.
They also suggest not using images that are more than 1500 pixels wide in that article, yet when you are creating a listing, they suggest using images at least 2000 pixels wide. I have thought about watermarking, but might think harder about it. If Google won't advertise your stuff because of it, then Etsy won't be charging you a buck for the Google referral if someone buys, right? Still, it's nice to get your stuff out there.
 
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