Antidetect Cloud
Continuing the series “Confessions about E-commerce Platforms” – Part 2: eBay
This article is about begging from the past! The knowledge here comes from around 2011 and 2019. What’s important should be said three times—this is the third time: Do not bring the present into this article, because this is simply a story retold from 10 years ago.
The e-commerce platform eBay—nowadays, it seems everyone already knows it. Back then, eBay had to court users, going door to door, proactively sending support emails and being extremely enthusiastic. But once they got rich, they squeezed users hard—throughout 2019, during the early wave of COVID, all we received was essentially a message like: “violation of eBay community standards”, and accounts got locked.
In the blink of an eye, it’s been 15 years since I first knew and used this platform. So consider this a memoir—if one day you get a second life, besides holding BTC and gold, remember not to make these mistakes.
2011 – The Beginning
2011 can be considered the first milestone when eBay started becoming popular internationally, as people learned to use Visa cards for cross-border shopping.
Back then, there was no concept of “antidetect,” no distinction between datacenter IP and residential IP. We only had things like buying SOCKS lists, scanning proxies by IP ranges and ports. There will be a separate article about IPs, but even 15 years later, I still don’t understand why I spent double the money back then to buy something called SSH. That was a mistake—if you ever get a second life, please don’t do that.
Back to eBay. At that time, there wasn’t a widespread concept of “seller” or e-commerce selling. Instead, there were “shippers” and “drop” (properly: droppers).
Shippers were mostly young people (90% aged 20–35), mainly students—many from Hanoi University of Science and Technology, but also from other schools.
I still remember a summer day in 2011, sitting at a pho restaurant on Tran Dai Nghia Street, overhearing a group at the next table bragging:
“Today I just hacked this PayPal account—so much money in it…”
Why mention this? Because at that time, PayPal was essentially the only payment method on eBay (besides bank transfers), and it was the only opportunity for shippers to make money.
How It Worked Back Then
They would obtain leaked email/password lists from the internet, or scan websites written in plain PHP, exploiting SQL injection (SQLi) vulnerabilities using tools like Havij to access databases and extract email|password data.
If passwords were hashed (e.g., MD5), they would use existing libraries to crack them into raw passwords.
Today, people call this “mail scan” or “via,” but back then we simply called it “list mail” (lít meo)—some foreigners called it “combo.”
Then what?
First, try logging into the email → called checking live email, often using SMTP.
Then, check whether those credentials work on valuable platforms—mainly eBay, PayPal, etc.
If successful → check available payment methods and account balance.
For what purpose?
To exploit and take money from foreign accounts under the slogan:
“Bring USD back to enrich Vietnam.”
This is illegal and nothing to be proud of, so I’ll keep it brief—just enough for those from that era to recall and understand the context.
Connection to eBay
Since PayPal was the only payment method, once PayPal approved a transaction and created an order, eBay would automatically mark it as successful—you just waited for the item to arrive.
Typically, people used the same proxy (HTTP/SOCKS) they used to log into PayPal to immediately make payments, assuming it would be the safest way to pass.
Later, PayPal introduced the frustrating error:
“Your purchase cannot be completed.”
Same-state SOCKS didn’t work
Same-city proxies were scarce
So hackers in Vietnam discovered a workaround: fake User Agent.
Due to logic/UI flaws, if you switched to a mobile User Agent (commonly Android or iPhone 4), PayPal wouldn’t ask security questions (“dính security” in slang).
In fact, you didn’t even need to fake IP—accounts from Vietnam could easily use US PayPal accounts to pay on eBay.
And the PED rate (orders marked as shipped with tracking) was extremely high.
Shipping Reality Back Then
Customs had little experience controlling goods origins
You just paid tax and received items directly from abroad
People bought all sorts of things on eBay:
Clothes
Toys (early drones—called “heli” back in 2011)
Headphones (e.g., Beats by Dr. Dre shipped from China)
Because of activities during:
2005–2009
2011–2016
Vietnam later ended up on the blacklist of major e-commerce platforms like Adidas, HP, Dell, Amazon…
After 2019
From 2019 onward, thanks to diplomatic efforts and economic reforms, Vietnam gradually regained access from many global brands.
At the same time:
The 2011 “shipper” concept evolved into “dropshipping”
And shady “courses” appeared teaching how to use e-gift cards
These courses taught:
Buying e-gifts
Using GreenDot, GoBank cards
Making profits from price differences
It looked legitimate because real money was used—but in reality, it was still unauthorized appropriation of funds from individuals or organizations.
All of this exploited US social welfare systems, wrapped in flashy labels like:
“high-tech”
“strategic thinking”
etc.
Meanwhile:
Course sellers became wealthy, living in luxury apartments (Time City, Royal City…)
Newcomers ended up quietly bearing losses and hiding their failures
What About Selling on eBay?
What is fake tracking?
What does “shipping a brick” mean?
How does eBay decide to limit accounts?
These answers will be covered in Part 2 – eBay in 2019, focusing entirely on selling on eBay.
