Fraud battle is going well: eBay

Font Size

Print

Feedback

Email

Discuss

: The online auction giant eBay wants the world to know that it is trying to clean up its site. In January, the 12-year-old company, based in San Jose, California, announced what it characterised as a significant shift in its philosophy toward protecting eBay members from fraud.

Instead of a more hands-off approach that emphasised giving members the tools to make their own choices, it rolled out new efforts to combat the sale of counterfeit items and revised its feedback system to give buyers and sellers more information about each other. It also says that in the last four months it has banished tens of thousands of sellers from its auction marketplace who did not meet new, elevated standards.

But many of its efforts have also fallen short. Other companies whose products are not yet protected by the new anti-counterfeiting measures still complain about piracy on eBay, and some longtime sellers complain that they are left in the dark about changes to the complex ecosystem on which they depend.

“Whenever you do things on eBay, you never necessarily get 100% of people happy with you,” said Meg Whitman, eBay’s chief executive. “We are very pleased with our anti-counterfeit efforts,” she said. “We’ve seen some dramatic results. We’ve also seen good adoption of our enhanced feedback system, though not every seller loves it. But I think over time it will help.”

Some ominous statistics forced eBay to get tough on fraud. The percentage of active users on the site, those who have participated in auctions in the last 12 months, declined from 41% in 2005 to 36% this year—a possible sign that fewer eBay members find the site a safe place to do business.

“A piece of improving the buyer experience is improving trust and safety,” Whitman said. The cornerstone of that effort is the anti-counterfeiting campaign. eBay says the sale of fake brand-name goods on its site exploded when it expanded to China in 2004, but rights-holders have complained to eBay about the problem for years.