For years, Carman Alfonsi relied upon Facebook Marketplace to buy and sell used pool tables for his Michigan billiards concern. He banked a steady stream of income from the wildly pop online bazaar.

Only this July, Alfonsi's Facebook account was hacked and used to post roughly 100 scam listings for cell phones and vehicles. The Marketplace posts directed buyers to contact an electronic mail address controlled past the scammers. When customers were left empty-handed, they sent enraged letters to Alfonsi by telephone and Facebook Messenger.

Alfonsi repeatedly contacted Facebook to warn that his account had been hijacked by fraudsters. Instead of fixing the problem, the social media behemothic banned him from using Market place, at one point removing his contour from its platform.

Now Alfonsi carries a gun in his own dwelling. He's concerned that an angry Market customer might show up at his forepart door.

"I'yard thinking I'm in problem and someone's going to come to my house and kicking my donkey," Alfonsi said.

Facebook'south Marketplace is unquestionably a business success. It hit 1 billion users a month this spring, and the company recently told investors that it's 1 of its most promising new sources of revenue.

That growth has been built, in function, on the visitor's assurances about the safety of its platform.

"Marketplace lets you see what real people in your ain community are selling. You tin can see their public Facebook contour, common friends and seller ratings so you can feel confident in your buy," the company says.

That conviction may be misguided. Facebook says it protects users through a mix of automated systems and human being reviews. But a ProPublica investigation based on internal corporate documents, interviews and law enforcement records reveals how those safeguards fail to protect buyers and sellers from scam listings, fake accounts and tearing crime.

Marketplace'due south first line of defense consists of software that scans each list for signs of fraud or other suspicious signals before it goes live. But Market workers said these detection services frequently fail to ban obvious scams and listings that violate Facebook'due south commerce policies. The automated systems also block some legitimate consumers from using the platform.

ProPublica reporters discovered a network of fake and suspicious accounts posting listings for dubious male enhancement supplements, which violated multiple Facebook policies. Facebook removed thousands of listings and took other punitive action against more 100 accounts after being informed of the action. In another case, Facebook temporarily banned the business relationship of an amateur fraud investigator who, an automatic message said, was filing too many complaints nearly scam listings on Marketplace.

As a backstop to its automated systems, Facebook Marketplace relies upon roughly 400 workers employed by consulting firm Accenture to respond to user complaints and to review listings flagged by the software. Until recently, Facebook Marketplace immune these depression-paid contract workers to police its site by giving them largely unfettered admission to Facebook Messenger inboxes, ProPublica has learned. This wide admission resulted in workers spying on romantic partners and other privacy violations, co-ordinate to electric current and onetime Accenture employees. The employees said the efforts they made were rarely successful in preventing fraud.

The social media behemothic'southward shortcomings in overseeing the service have made it easier for fraudsters to perpetrate a litany of scams. Internal Market place documents, police force enforcement bulletins from multiple countries and media reports describe frauds involving lottery numbers, puppies, apartment rentals, PlayStation 5 and Xbox gaming consoles, work visas, sports betting, loans, outdoor pools, Bitcoin, auto insurance, event tickets, vaccine cards, male enhancement products, miracle beauty creams, vehicle sales, furniture, tools, aircraft containers, Brazilian rainforest country and even egg farms, among other enterprises. Scammers target both buyers and sellers, resulting in financial losses, hacked Facebook accounts and stolen personal information.

Since the start of the pandemic, criminals across America have exploited Marketplace to commit armed robberies and, in 13 instances identified by ProPublica, homicide. In i loftier-profile example, a woman was allegedly murdered by a human being who was selling a cheap fridge on Marketplace. The alleged killer'due south contour remained online with agile listings until ProPublica contacted Facebook.

In many means, Marketplace's flaws reverberate Facebook's approach to overseeing its platform. It launches and scales new products quickly thanks to an unrivaled user base of roughly 3 billion people, and then leans heavily on automated systems, low-paid contractors and a smaller number of full-time Facebook employees to enforce its rules. This approach allowed misinformation to run rampant in News Feed, saw Facebook groups go hotbeds of fierce voice communication and radicalization, and enabled scammers to earn millions by placing ads that rip off users.

Much of the commerce on Marketplace is perfectly legitimate, and all companies that connect local buyers and sellers — called peer-to-peer sales in the industry — feel problems with user safety and fraud and other crimes.

Major law enforcement investigations have uncovered criminal offence rings selling stolen products on Amazon and eBay. By ane accounting, Craigslist has figured in more than 130 murders since 2007. The recent spate of murders with links to Marketplace occurred during an overall upsurge in violent criminal offense in the U.S.

Gauging the scale of the criminal activity on Market — or making comparisons between information technology and its competitors — is hard. FBI statistics don't effectively track all online market fraud, nor do they provide incident rates for individual companies. The bureau'southward Internet Crime Complaint Center, or IC3 — which collects consumer reports of all types of online crimes — documented near 792,000 full incidents in 2020, an virtually seventy% increment over the previous year.

A Facebook spokesperson said the company invests heavily in automated systems and teams of reviewers to prevent scams and fraud on Market, and that it works closely with police force enforcement. He declined to comment on individual user cases or violent crimes linked to Marketplace transactions.

"All online marketplaces confront challenges and ours is no exception, which is why we're always working to prevent new ways to scam and defraud people. Any proposition that we aren't trying to solve these complex problems or protect people who use Marketplace is non only false just misunderstands our entire approach to rubber," said Drew Pusateri, the spokesperson. "People utilize it because their experiences are positive, and to help make sure that continues, we are working to improve our enforcement and deliver the highest quality peer-to-peer online marketplace available."

Pusateri said Accenture analysts working on Marketplace could view Messenger inboxes in the past, only that this access was recently restricted to messages exchanged on Marketplace.

Market entered the internet classified game years afterward other companies put in place tools to combat scams and the auction of stolen goods. However Facebook, experts and former employees told ProPublica, has failed to create comparable safeguards despite the visitor's considerable fiscal resource and expertise in policing online activity.

EBay, for example, has been praised for introducing an escrow service and providing refunds for fraudulent car sales. The company also created a program that proactively looks for stolen goods being sold on its platform. Afterwards grappling for years with widespread used vehicle fraud, Craigslist began charging users to post car listings, which experts said reduced such offers.

Facebook, eBay and Craigslist, amidst others, do non disclose information almost fraudulent listings on their sites. Craigslist did not respond to multiple requests for annotate. Amazon and eBay said they don't permit stolen goods or scams on their platforms.

"Stolen goods are not tolerated on eBay," a spokesperson for that company said. "EBay takes the trust and rubber of our users very seriously and is fully committed to providing a secure online shopping feel to millions of consumers around the globe."

"Amazon does not allow 3rd-party sellers to listing stolen goods in our store, and we work closely with law enforcement, retailers, and brands to cease bad actors and hold them accountable, including withholding funds, terminating accounts, and making constabulary enforcement referrals," said a spokesperson for Amazon.

Two months after Alfonsi'south account was hacked, he'southward however banned from using Marketplace, a state of affairs he says hurts his business.

"I'm dead in the water hither, because people won't utilise Craigslist anymore. I tell people that the only things left in the world will be Market and Amazon," he said.

Scammers' New Favorite

Facebook Marketplace was launched in 2016 subsequently the social media company saw the popularity of local Facebook groups dedicated to trading and selling things. It created the service as a defended hub where people could post used items for sale — cars, clothes, boats, toys — and get connected to buyers, usually living in the same area, to consummate the transaction. Market place was heavily promoted via a prominent tab on Facebook's mobile apps.

At the fourth dimension, Marketplace product director Bowen Pan said Facebook would ban items or sellers that broke its rules. But Pan likewise emphasized that the company was not responsible for safeguarding transactions. "We run across our role equally simply connecting buyers and sellers," he told TechCrunch. Pan left Facebook at the terminate of 2020, and did not respond to a asking for comment.

Near immediately, Facebook was criticized for assuasive listings of such prohibited items as weapons, illegal drugs and adult services, causing the company to temporarily pause the rollout of Marketplace.

When information technology restarted, the service quickly took off amid thrifters, small business owners and people looking to purchase or sell household items. Less than a year after it launched, 18 1000000 listings were posted to Marketplace in a single month. Marketplace is now available in more than 150 countries and territories.

Marketplace had an instant reward over longtime players in peer-to-peer sales, such as Craigslist. At the time, more than than 1.v billion people had a Facebook account, and they could instantly create listings that would be viewed by people in their areas. Market also worked seamlessly on smartphones, while Craigslist didn't launch a mobile app until late 2019.

Marketplace offered another selling point, experts said. Equally opposed to Craigslist, which allows users to post anonymously, each Marketplace listing is connected to a Facebook account, increasing consumers' trust by actualization to offer more information most a prospective heir-apparent or seller.

That "lends a fiddling bit more than of a veneer of condom than Craigslist, where you can make up an email address, and who knows what you're going to get," said Sucharita Kodali, a Forrester Inquiry vice president and principal analyst focused on e-commerce.

By 2021, Marketplace had pulled ahead of Craigslist, its closest competitor, in popularity amongst U.S. consumers, according to a survey by Forrester. It found that xiv% of people had made a purchase using Marketplace, every bit opposed to six% for Craigslist. Ii years before, only 6% of respondents said they'd made a purchase using Marketplace.

What fabricated the service popular with users has also made it popular with criminals and con artists. Marketplace's ease of use, integration into the dominant global social network and Facebook's preexisting problem with simulated and hacked accounts have made the platform a favorite choice for organized retail crime gangs and international cybercriminals, according to law enforcement, retail security executives and contained experts who closely track incidents of fraud.

Credit: Glenn Harvey, special to ProPublica

Fraudsters come from all over the globe to find victims on Market. Workers charged with helping police the service say many cons are run by organized rings operating from countries in Eastern Europe and Africa. Internal Market place documents show that Facebook identified several countries as "high risk" due to the book of scams run by people based at that place, and the fact that they often target people in other countries.

Facebook has expanded the service into known fraud hot spots. Republic of benin was one of the countries identified internally as having an "unusually high scam prevalence." Before Market was even available in the West African nation, cybercriminals there used fake or hacked accounts to post listings for artificial loans and male enhancement supplements targeted at people in other French-speaking countries, co-ordinate to company documents. Yet Facebook officially launched Marketplace in Benin at the cease of August.

To protect Marketplace's more one billion monthly users, Facebook relies heavily on bogus intelligence that scans each listing before information technology goes alive. Workers said that the organisation oft fails to identify scams. A current Marketplace staffer said the arrangement misses obvious red flags such as hacked accounts and suspiciously low-priced items.

Facebook has roughly 400 such workers employed past Accenture in the U.S., Ireland, Bharat and Singapore. Each worker is typically required to handle more than 600 complaints or assist requests a day — a charge per unit of less than one minute per incident — many of which involve Facebook users who've lost coin.

Facebook said it does not enforce quotas for processing complaints, and the roughly 400-person Accenture workforce does not represent the total number of people working to secure Marketplace. The company declined to provide the number of people working on Market place safe and security. Accenture declined to comment.

Multiple Marketplace contract workers told ProPublica they rarely, if ever, stop scams before they happen. The contractors go involved subsequently someone has already been ripped off, banning fraudsters and in some cases helping restore hacked Facebook accounts to their original users.

"It'south 100% reactive, it's not proactive," said a onetime contractor who worked on Market for roughly two years. The person also asked not to be named considering of a nondisclosure agreement. "I don't think I've e'er stopped anyone from getting robbed."

Marketplace contractors had access to the Facebook Messenger inboxes of people on the platform. This broad level of access, which enabled them to read all messages sent and received, was driveling by workers, according to current and former Accenture employees. Some snooped on sometime romantic partners and were fired as a effect, they said.

"If most people knew how much access these random people on the Marketplace had to their info, it would make them shit a brick," the former contractor said. "It'due south creepy, and we do not need that overwhelmingly intrusive access."

Inbox access let analysts meet if an business relationship was copying and pasting the same suspicious bulletin to dissimilar prospective buyers or sellers or directing them off-platform to continue the scam, for case. But the access likewise opened the door to invasions of privacy, according to multiple workers.

"What shocked me the well-nigh is at that place was not whatsoever guidance for information protection in training," said a former worker. "I was given inbox access six hours after signing my onboarding papers."

If a contractor tried to look in the inbox of someone in their ain friend network, the system cautioned them about such access. In that location was too a pop-upwards if a worker attempted to access the business relationship of someone on Facebook'southward internal list of high-profile individuals, such as politicians or celebrities, or if they attempted to access the inbox of a Facebook employee. Facebook employees were the but people notified if contractors accessed their Messenger inboxes, according to multiple sources.

Pusateri, the Facebook spokesperson, acknowledged that the workers formerly had admission to users' Messenger inboxes, but said that was no longer the case. He said workers tin now view the Marketplace messages sent and received by a user every bit part of an investigation, but they exercise non have access to the full Messenger inbox. He also said workers receive data privacy training.

"We have protocols in place, in accordance with local laws, that limit what Marketplace messages can exist reviewed, and accept a zip-tolerance policy for unauthorized access," he said. "Anyone institute to violate this policy, whether a full-time employee or contingent worker, is subject area to termination."

Internal Marketplace documents obtained by ProPublica reveal that Facebook expects workers to be familiar with dozens of types of fraud across more than than 25 countries. New, widespread cons are declared "trends," and are written up with data about how to spot them and what action to take. There are too country-specific documents about trends that outline mutual scams and tactics around the world.

As examples, the internal documents cite specific Facebook accounts implicated in scams. The company appears not to accept taken activity confronting some of those accounts. ProPublica found 15 that were still active every bit of September. Ane such account was cited as part of a widespread Market con in which users claimed to be selling highly sought-afterwards PS5 consoles just never delivered them to buyers. The account belongs to a homo in Alabama who manages a page with the name "Playstation five Console'due south" besides as a Facebook group called "Playstation five Orders." He did not answer to multiple requests for annotate from ProPublica.

Facebook does not disclose statistics, but the sheer scale of Market place suggests that thousands of contiguous sales are facilitated by the company on a daily ground. Since the pandemic hit, law forces effectually the earth accept issued warnings nearly scams and about gangs robbing people who respond to Marketplace listings. Loss prevention staff at major retailers are also struggling to stop organized retail crime outfits that steal inventory and use Marketplace to fence it faster than ever before.

"I go on Facebook Marketplace and you tin can tell some of the things are stolen. There was a guy on there with 200 bottles of Tide. Really? Who has 200 bottles of Tide?" said Rachel Michelin, president and CEO of the California Retailers Association. "We really need to start looking at these online marketplaces."

Even when users are accused of violent crimes related to Marketplace transactions, Facebook doesn't appear to bar them from standing to purchase or sell on the platform.

ProPublica found iv active Facebook accounts belonging to people charged with murder related to Marketplace transactions. Of those, two still had active listings on Marketplace.

In Pennsylvania, Denise Williams, 54, was interested in buying a cheap refrigerator she had plant on Facebook Market. She wound upwardly bleeding to expiry from multiple stab wounds.

According to court documents, 26-year-old Joshua Gorgone admitted to police that he stabbed Williams when she came to his apartment in April to buy the used fridge, which he'd posted for $160. Then, police said, Gorgone wrapped Williams in a blanket and dumped her on his bathroom floor, where she was "left to dice next to the toilet." Gorgone told police that he stole her 2019 Chevrolet Trax SUV and used her money to buy heroin, court records show.

Currently in custody in the Cambria County jail, Gorgone has been charged with homicide, robbery, abuse of a corpse and other charges. He has pleaded not guilty.

As of this August, Gorgone, who went by the username Thraxx Mula, was still on Facebook with four active Market place listings. Afterward ProPublica contacted Facebook, his account was deactivated.

Joshua Gorgone's Facebook Market place contour. Credit: Screengrab past ProPublica from Facebook

Facebook declined to annotate on how its policies employ to accounts that belong to people charged with crimes connected to Market place.

"Marketplace is kind of an like shooting fish in a barrel target," said the former Market place worker. "Information technology's mostly boomers and old people who are simply trying to sell something. And every now and then you come across people who are coming together people from Marketplace and robbing them at gunpoint."

Marketplace'south growth has coincided with Craigslist's decline, co-ordinate to Peter M. Zollman, the founding chief of AIM Group, a business organization intelligence firm that closely tracks the classifieds and marketplace industries.

Zollman said Craigslist has done a poor task handling scams and user safe, simply that these issues have "slowed, bluntly, because Craigslist has slowed" as a concern. Market place'southward exploding growth makes it a focal point for scammers and the security issues that plague services of its kind.

"There is ever going to be a scam or three. Could Facebook be doing more? Absolutely. Merely are they taking more steps than many marketplaces? Yes," he said. "And maybe they demand to do a lot more."

Hacked

Hacked or faked Facebook accounts are ane of the biggest bug plaguing Marketplace, according to experts, internal documents and a ProPublica review of hundreds of dubious profiles. Such accounts may give a false sense of security to users, who believe them to be 18-carat.

In April, Houston police issued a public alert identifying a local human being they said had used at least iv dissimilar profiles to fix bogus Facebook Marketplace deals and then rob the people who showed upwardly to run across him. According to police, the human used a string of different names but kept the same contour picture.

In other cases, cybercriminals compromise Facebook users' accounts and deploy them to postal service listings for vehicles, phones and other high-value items. They convince buyers to pay in advance. Once payment is received, the scammer cuts off contact, never delivering the trade. Beyond making a listing seem legitimate to the boilerplate buyer, using a existent account also leaves the person with the compromised account to deal with the victims.

After discovering he had been hacked, Alfonsi, the billiards company possessor, reached out to Facebook for help securing his business relationship. Weeks went by with no response. Then people started contacting him near a truck. Alfonsi's account was again existence used by a scammer. ProPublica found 78 listings for three different vehicles on his account.

"I accept no idea how they were able to place them," he said.

Alfonsi once again tried contacting Facebook, but didn't receive an reply — and shortly he discovered he'd been banned from posting to Marketplace, cut off a critical source of revenue for his business organisation. He said the prevalence of hacked accounts on Marketplace could scare off users.

"At present everyone is hacking into Marketplace, so no one'southward going to trust information technology anymore," he said.

After yet more scam vehicle ads were placed using his account, Facebook removed Alfonsi'southward Facebook profile in August without telling him. His account was eventually restored by September, though Alfonsi is still blocked from using Marketplace.

Facebook "never got dorsum to me, it just kept getting worse and worse," he said.

Alfonsi's experience highlights another problem with Marketplace, workers said. Facebook's bogus intelligence systems regularly ban the accounts of legitimate sellers and small business organization owners. At one point earlier this year, there was a backlog of roughly 700,000 car-banned accounts whose owners had appealed to Facebook for reinstatement, according to a electric current worker. They said the system auto-bans accounts for suspicious signals, and has been mistakenly banning legitimate accounts for shut to a year.

Facebook said information technology has automated systems and teams of people focused on banning fakes and investigating hacked accounts across its services. It said it'southward hiring more people to assist with reviewing listings and flagging compromised accounts on Market.

Cars: Profit and Peril

In a 2019 earnings call, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg singled out vehicle ads as one of the most lucrative segments on Marketplace.

"Nosotros're seeing a lot of involvement, peculiarly with retail and auto advertisers," she said.

Scam artists have likewise shown a deep interest in the concern of used vehicles on Market place.

A current Marketplace worker with insight into overall trends said used vehicle fraud is currently one of the biggest issues on Marketplace.

Fraudsters typically mail a listing with multiple photos of an highly-seasoned vehicle, priced well below market charge per unit. When interested buyers reach out, scammers send a detailed message with information about the maintenance and ownership history of the vehicle. They as well may explain that the toll is low because the vehicle belonged to a recently deceased relative, or because the seller is a U.S. soldier nearly to ship out.

The thieves ask potential buyers to share basic personal data and then they tin arrange what they falsely merits is a secure purchase via an escrow service, or eBay's Vehicle Purchase Protection plan, which provides upward to $100,000 in repayment for losses associated with fraud. The eBay plan, however, only works for vehicle purchases made on eBay. Once buyers ship money to what they recall is a legitimate tertiary political party, the seller breaks off contact.

Mark Reeves, an IT consultant in Shreveport, Louisiana, helps run a Facebook group defended to outing online marketplace crooks. Many of them, he said, are based overseas and take shifted from Craigslist to Marketplace.

"These people that are outside the U.South. demand to be declared economic terrorists because they are getting away with billions of dollars a year in scams," Reeves said.

Marketplace'due south competitors take in recent years implemented measures to rein in con artists. After used vehicle frauds proliferated on Craigslist, the company implemented a policy in 2019 that required people to pay to mail ads for used cars. The reform resulted in fewer such scams on the service, experts said.

EBay has taken several initiatives to protect users shopping for cars. Its Vehicle Purchase Protection plan has offered upward to $100,000 in reimbursement for fraud since 2016. The visitor as well maintains a partnership with an online escrow firm which acts every bit an intermediary in vehicle deals, ensuring that sellers get paid and buyers receive the cars, trucks, boats, or motorcycles they were promised. Using the escrow program is voluntary.

At times, withal, Facebook has seemed more interested in increasing sales than safety. In 2017, Marketplace rolled out new features, such as listing Kelley Blueish Book Values, to expand automobile sales. To educate users about mutual signs of Market used car scams, it offers 3 bullet points of tips in Facebook's Help Center, and full general guidance in a more than detailed guide focused on buying a used car. It has not developed features specifically aimed at stopping used car fraud.

ProPublica interviewed an apprentice fraud hunter who said he spends hours each day scouring Market for scam vehicle listings and reporting them to the company for removal. The individual, a retiree who asked non be named due to retaliation fears, said vehicle scammers take shifted from Craigslist to Marketplace. He outset noticed fraudulent used car postings on Craigslist in 2004 and began contacting the cybercriminals to empathize their tactics and waste their time with emails that distracted them from 18-carat targets.

"The problem just got worse on Craigslist until recently when Craigslist started charging a fee to post motorcar ads ... I began to see the same group migrate to Facebook in the final year or two en mass," the fraud hunter wrote in an email. "Facebook allows hundreds if not thousands of these every mean solar day."

He continued: "It's worse than ever. There is nowhere to turn for assist."

Credit: Glenn Harvey, special to ProPublica

He shared several examples of fraudulent Marketplace listings that use a set of photos of a 1998 Chevrolet Silverado truck he previously saw used by overseas fraudsters in scam Craigslist listings for years. "Facebook is now their cesspool of choice," he said.

In September, Facebook temporarily blocked his account from reporting suspicious listings on Market. An automated message said he'd reported too many listings in a short period, triggering a break.

"Facebook has at present blocked ME for reporting as well many scam sites," he wrote in an email, adding that the company is "out of control as the scammers post the fakes in Marketplace on an endless loop."

Experts said that scam vehicle listings typically show a toll significantly lower than the value of the truck or auto; feature a description instructing prospective buyers to contact the seller past email; and show that the user has turned on the "holiday" feature, which prevents people from using Facebook Messenger to contact the account that posted the listing. Fake or compromised accounts often post dozens of identical vehicle listings targeted at locations all over the U.S.

On the basis of those criteria, ProPublica identified hundreds of potential scam listings for cars, trucks and campers placed by hacked accounts belonging to existent estate agents, musicians and other people based in the U.South.

Just Facebook's automated systems, which are trained to ban or flag suspicious listings, failed to recognize and remove the apparent scam postings.

After conducting searches for low-priced trucks, ProPublica was soon being recommended fraudulent truck listings by Facebook'south systems.

"It goes dorsum to Facebook's complete refusal to have responsibility for pretty much anything that happens on its platform," said Kodali, the Forrester analyst. "They're non peculiarly incented to shut this down. And I think what kind of is the shocking matter almost online marketplaces in our unabridged society is that there'south no rules and regulations, at that place'due south no governance around marketplaces."

Every bit people struggled to find housing or moved cities during the pandemic, Market place also saw an increase in fraudulent apartment and house rental listings, according to police notices, media reports and workers.

Scammers re-create photos from legitimate real estate ads and repost them in artificial Marketplace listings, offering homes and apartments at below market rates. Oft, the fraudsters apply hacked accounts belonging to real estate agents to make their listings announced more legitimate. They may tell prospective renters that the apartment can't be viewed in person due to the pandemic, but send additional photos and information to put people at ease. The crooks convince the renter to ship a deposit via an electronic payment service and promise to employ a courier to ship the keys, which never arrive.

The scam has claimed victims across the U.S., in Australia, the U.M., and Canada, among other places. A man in Trenton, Ontario, who was selling his house said people showed up at his door claiming they'd paid him a eolith to rent the property.

"I lady said, 'I sent $one,000 to you,' and I said it definitely didn't come to me," Allan Ballach, the owner, told CTV News Toronto.

Fifty-fifty listings that openly flout Facebook policies have flourished on Marketplace.

While browsing Marketplace, ProPublica identified a network of hundreds of false accounts that posted thousands of listings for a male enhancement product that violates Facebook'due south rules confronting ingestible supplements and sexually positioned products.

An assay of account bios, friend lists and posting patterns shows the fake accounts appear to be controlled by people in Ecuador who oftentimes say they are affiliated with Omnilife, a Mexican conglomerate that uses multilevel marketing to sell health products. The accounts post Spanish-language Marketplace listings that prominently characteristic women in suggestive positions and tight clothing.

The listings, which were typically targeted to cities in Texas, are accompanied by text that tells men they can enlarge their penises or last longer in bed. Other listings for the male enhancement products used cucumbers and other phallic imagery combined with attractive women in suggestive poses. Some accounts in the network also used before and later photos — banned by Facebook — in Marketplace listings to market weight loss and male hair growth products.

ProPublica followed upwardly with multiple sellers on Marketplace and was sent details for 2 Omnilife supplements that one seller said contain "nutrients that the body and limb needs to brand a POWERFUL erection." The cost ranged from $129 to $159.99 for 2 boxes of supplements that each contained 30 doses. Multiple accounts identified themselves as being affiliated with Omnilife or used company products in their contour or background image. Some of the fake accounts claimed to exist based in the U.Southward. and used stolen contour photos, while others listed their location as Ecuador.

Omnilife officials did not respond to attempts to contact them.

Facebook said it disabled some of the accounts flagged by ProPublica, banned others from posting to Marketplace and forced roughly 100 of the accounts to provide additional information in order to help confirm their buying and authenticity.

The Coin Maker

Every bit Marketplace users lose money to scams and dubious products, Facebook earns revenue thanks to a range of increasingly profitable Marketplace advertisements that appear alongside complimentary Market listings.

In 2017 Facebook began placing ads on Marketplace listings from the millions of advertisers that pay to advertise across the company'south products. Starting in 2018, Facebook as well immune users to pay to "boost" a Market listing to ensure it was seen by more people. Those new revenue streams are among Facebook's most promising, co-ordinate to visitor executives.

The visitor does not break out Market revenue in its fiscal results, and declined to share figures with ProPublica. A spokesperson said that Marketplace remains a very small fraction of the visitor'due south roughly $85 billion in almanac revenue. Just the product continues to be touted by Facebook executives equally an increasingly important revenue source.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg praised Marketplace's advertising growth on the previous company earnings call.

"Commerce ads continue to do very well and drive a meaningful corporeality of our overall business concern. We built Marketplace into 1 of the world'south leading services for people to buy and sell," Zuckerberg said.

Reeves, the Louisiana IT consultant who tracks Marketplace scams, criticized Facebook for profiting from bogus vehicle and existent estate ads. He'southward spoken to real estate agents and others whose accounts were hacked and used to post advertisements on Market place.

"Facebook is an accompaniment by accepting coin for scam ads," he said.

Facebook said it invests heavily in advertizing review and that it refunds advertisers if their accounts were compromised and used to buy ads.

The Modern Pawn Shop

Last winter, police in Kansas began circulating an alarm: Thieves had hitting an equipment rental company three times in contempo weeks, stealing 2 welding machines, two hydraulic pumps and an electric generator.

Their biggest score, though, was a white-and-orange Bobcat brand front-stop loader, a piece of heavy earthmoving equipment that can sell for upwards of $l,000.

According to the bulletin, which ProPublica obtained, a homo and woman rented the machine from the United Rentals location in Olathe — possibly using simulated identification — and never returned it. The thieves then listed the Bobcat on Marketplace, eventually selling it to an unwitting victim for $13,500.

United Rentals and the Olathe police investigator working the case did not respond to requests for annotate.

Experts said that Market and other online sales platforms have transformed the business of theft, providing small-time crime rings and larger underworld operations with an piece of cake way to unload stolen items. An August survey from the National Retail Federation, an association of concatenation and big-box retailers, constitute that 69% of respondents had seen an increase in organized retail crime over the past year.

"It's the online marketplaces that are driving the increase in retail theft," said Lisa LaBruno of the Retail Industry Leaders Association. "The thieves who steal these products en masse need platforms to sell their goods."

LaBruno, a loss prevention proficient and former prosecutor, continued: "You have online marketplaces that offer anonymity. And they have very few checks and balances to vet sellers or make sure that they aren't selling stolen goods."

Michelin, of the California Retailers Association, noted that many retailers apply teams focused on stopping the loss of inventory to theft past corrupt employees, shoplifters or thieves who target warehouses and supply trucks. But those loss prevention investigators oft get stonewalled or ignored when they contact companies similar Facebook to betoken out stolen goods, she said.

"Nosotros need these online marketplaces to be willing to sit down and work with u.s.a.," she told ProPublica. "My promise is that they don't want this blazon of criminal activity happening on their websites and platforms."

​​Loss prevention specialists who spoke to ProPublica said eBay monitors its sales listings far more aggressively than Facebook. The company uses both staffers and automated tools to actively search out suspicious ads and user accounts. In 2008, eBay began sharing data with retailers through a program called PROACT meant to terminate the auction of stolen goods on the platform. The company, which says it complies with U.Southward. and international privacy laws, has also created a dedicated portal for police force enforcement agencies seeking information about suspect listings. Last year it received roughly 5,000 requests for information from U.S. police force enforcement agencies, according to an eBay spokesperson.

Federal legislation may soon strength changes at Facebook and its competitors. The INFORM Consumers Act, introduced earlier this twelvemonth by Autonomous Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois, is the retail manufacture's attempt to bring accountability to online marketplaces. The bill would require online marketplaces to verify the identity of people selling goods on their platforms, amid other reforms.

"Marketplaces have become the mod pawn shop, but with no accountability, no transparency and no physical address for law enforcement to investigate," said Michael Hanson, spokesperson for the Buy Safe America Coalition, a group of traditional retailers pushing the legislation. "The anonymity they provide has fabricated them a safety infinite for criminals to build a concern model around theft."

Companies including eBay, Etsy and Amazon are publicly opposing the proposed legislation, saying it would burden sellers with new regulations and favor big box retail chains. The Internet Association, a trade group representing Facebook and other large tech firms, has come up out against the beak. "Large Retail needs to gear up its own problem," said the association in a argument. "The INFORM Act does not end crime or counterfeiting in stores or online, but information technology volition expose the individual personal information of legitimate small business owners — many of whom are single person companies, ofttimes female-owned."

Forth with loss prevention departments at retailers, state and local constabulary often behave the burden of responding to complaints and crimes committed using Market place and services like it. In a six-twenty-four hours bridge last month, constabulary in 1 county in England reported 21 incidents of theft associated with Facebook Marketplace.

"We are urging those selling high value electrical items online, particularly on Facebook Marketplace, to be vigilant following a number of reports where people pretending to be 'buyers' have walked away with the goods after convincing the seller they accept paid via bank transfer," said an Baronial notice from the Hampshire Constabulary.

"Violent Criminal Actors"

The FBI has long warned that Marketplace and similar services could be exploited by criminals looking for easy scores.

In a 2018 bulletin, bureau analysts said that "trigger-happy criminal actors" were "very likely" to "employ online resale platforms to target victims for armed robberies." The 8-folio intelligence cursory encouraged investigators to "become familiar" with Marketplace and 11 other platforms. In the agency's view, armed robberies were likely to become more widespread and "victims will continue to be victimized when both selling and purchasing items."

From crime information, it'southward impossible to tell whether such incidents have indeed increased — the statistics are non nearly granular enough. Facebook said it employs a specialized squad dedicated to working with police enforcement that provides information and support on a wide range of requests.

Only information technology's clear that ­Marketplace is being exploited by criminals across the country. And, at to the lowest degree in some cases, Marketplace's safeguards oasis't prevented those criminals from using the service to commit one robbery after another.

Early on this year a federal judge sentenced a Missouri homo to 10 years in prison after he had used the platform to prepare three armed robberies. Prosecutors said the robber shot one of his victims in the leg.​ Ohio police in Baronial arrested a teenager they said was responsible for at least a dozen robberies orchestrated through Marketplace. He was armed with a pistol when officers captured him during a sting performance.

A scattering of these robberies have concluded in murder.

Information technology was June one when Kyle Craig gear up out from his home on Mississippi'due south Gulf Coast and drove north to a minor, run-down truck end just off Interstate 55. He'd made arrangements on Market place to buy a used off-road vehicle. Craig was supposed to run across the seller, a stranger, at the truck stop.

When Craig failed to return or answer his phone, his loved ones became alarmed.

The next morning, Craig's grandmother Debbie Steiner headed out with a pocket-size search posse, made upward of a 6 friends and kin. Using a smartphone app, the grouping was able to pinpoint the exact location of Craig's phone in a wood non far from the truck cease outside the boondocks of West, a poor, rural outpost in fundamental Mississippi.

At that place the searchers constitute Craig's corpse lying in a swath of dumbo woodlands used by a hunting club. He had been shot more than 20 times.

"That'due south when our whole world changed forever," Steiner said. Later the coroner hauled Craig's torso out of the forest, Steiner, weeping, bent down and kissed the ground where he'd lain. She didn't know what else to do.

Much remains murky about Craig'due south final hours, only his family believes the Facebook Marketplace listing that caught his attending and led him to Holmes County was a trap used to lure him to his death. Prosecutors take charged 5 men and teenagers in connexion with the murder. All five accept pleaded not guilty.

Sheriff Willie March told ProPublica that he believes 4 of the defendants were involved in a similar criminal offense that occurred approximately a month earlier. The victim in that case was a man who posted a listing for a used ATV on Facebook and was supposed to come across a prospective buyer at a gas station almost 20 miles down I-55 from the site where Craig's trunk was recovered. But when the victim arrived at the gas station, he was robbed by a group of immature men, who stole the off-route vehicle and took off.

March wasn't sure whether the deal was arranged over Marketplace or through informal channels on Facebook.

"I know they were stealing a lot of four-wheelers, and they were using Facebook to annunciate them to sell them," March said of the defendants. He added that prosecutors haven't brought charges related to the robbery because they're focused on the Craig murder case, which is more circuitous and carries far more astringent potential penalties.

Craig was robbed and killed when he attempted to purchase the off-road vehicle, March said. According to the family, Craig was carrying at to the lowest degree $5,000 in cash at the time of his murder.

His family unit said the 26-year-old had spent the ameliorate office of a decade scouring online classified ads starting time on Craigslist and, more recently, on Marketplace in search of vehicles that he could buy and resell for a profit. For Craig, information technology was a total-time job.

Craig'south fiance, Shelbie Garbutt, didn't consider his occupation to be peculiarly risky; her main worry was that he might get in a car wreck while traveling to learn or drop off a vehicle spotted on Market place. "It kind of was just like any other job to usa," she said. "I never imagined something like this would ever happen."

She recently historic the beginning birthday of their son, Brantley, without Craig. "Losing Kyle is and so, so devastating to me," Garbutt said. "Information technology's difficult to even get out of bed some days."

Disclosure: Craig Newmark, the founder of Craigslist, and the craigslist Charitable Fund have supported the work of ProPublica. One of the authors of this article, Craig Silverman, edits a volume serial for the European Journalism Centre, which has received funding from the Craig Newmark Foundation. Newmark is a shareholder of Craigslist but has not been involved in the day-to-24-hour interval operations of Craigslist since 2000.

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Alex Mierjeski contributed reporting.