Tell HN: Amazon order info is getting sold

11 points by aleyan 1 year ago | 8 comments

Today from Amazon, I bought an iPad (sold by Amazon.com) and an iPad cover (sold by ZMSolutions in receipt, TiMOVO in Amazon order page) in a single order at 10:11 AM EST. At 10:15 AM EST I received an obvious scam call asking if I authorize a MacBook Pro purchase from Amazon.

I rarely receive scam calls, so its proximity to an actual purchase has me very concerned. Since it was a phone call, it means not only my online shopping history and phone number, but probably also email and physical address were compromised.

I don’t know who in the purchase supply chain sold my info to scammers, but somebody did and very quickly too. Be safe out there.

For completeness, I am including the voicemail transcript: “This call is to authorize the payment of $1499 for the recent order of Apple MacBook Pro on your Amazon account if you do not authorize this payment please press one to speak to our customer support representative”. The call was from +1 (843) 966-5162.

LinuxBender 1 year ago |

I believe a third party of Amazon has been leaking information for quite some time. Every summer the porch pirates and their boss are in my neck of the woods and they will park right in front of my place if my order is over $400. They know when the order is expected to arrive here. The pirates are quite brazen and fearless given everyone here is armed and a percentage of people here utilize constitutional carry, stand your ground and castle doctrine which are all fully embraced by the governor and local Sheriff.

RGamma 1 year ago | |

If this is actually true that's kinda insane. They seem trivial to honeypot for the police though (and then follow the trail to the leak).

LinuxBender 1 year ago | | |

My theory is they are counting on sting operations to be quite a PITA to set up. They cost money whereas writing tickets all day brings in money. It would probably take a pirate targeting the home of a chief or showing up when the chiefs grandkids get home from school as these pirate often do with vans. Porch Pirates can probably avoid this by looking at order history. Amazon sell a lot of law enforcement gear and gadgets.

fckgw 1 year ago |

What you're describing is a coincidence.

These phone calls and emails go out to tens of thousands of people every day. A small portion of those people will have just made an Amazon purchase.

The Apple branding is irrelevant. The scammers always use Apple products in their scripts, it denotes "expensive item".

No, Amazon is not "selling your info" to scammers.

hnburnsy 1 year ago |

Don't order Apple goods from any retailer for delivery. Retailer and shipper employees are tipping off others that your package contains an Apple product. Only buy for in store pickup and open the package at the counter.

paraboli 1 year ago |

fwiw I recieved the same scam call this morning and didn't buy anything from amazon today

brudgers 1 year ago |

If you got an email about your purchase, there's a lot of opportunity to establish you bought something from Amazon.

If you used a credit card, there's a lot of opportunity to establish you bought something from Amazon.

If you bought something fulfilled by Amazon, there is more than a lot of opportunity to establish you bought something on Amazon...there is certain knowledge and any nefarious activity is likely to be assumed to be blamed on Amazon.

If an adversarial actor was trying to exfiltrate purchase data, TiMOVO would be an easier target than Amazon. Good luck.

jethronethro 1 year ago |

Sorry to hear this happened to you.

It's yet another reason I don't use Amazon. Sure, I might pay more for what I buy but I don't need to worry about my information being shared or sold by a giant of surveillance capitalism.