E-Bay Better At National Security Than Government

Photo Sharing - Upload Video - Video Sharing Well, ANOTHER video is out from Al Qaeda. (I’m shocked)… but every time this happens, and then I listen to, or read the media coverage, I AM SHOCKED. “They” (from either side of the political isle), ALWAYS REPORT on the “shocking new video), placed on some “mysterious militant Arab website”, and somehow miraculously pirated into Al Jezzerra TV…etc., etc. This time, there’s “two mysteries”… this time… an American (who should be shot in the head NOW), that has been wanted by the FBI since at least 2004 has appeared in the video too. This isn’t the first time Adam Yehiye Gadahn, 28 of Southern California has appeared in Al Qaeda videos, but this time he seemed to be the star asking good American folks to heed the “dire warning” to convert to Islam or else feel the wrath later on…blah…blah…blah. NEW VIDEO STORY HERE… 2004 STORY OF ADAM GADAHN HERE… Now, you may ask how this post has anything at all to do with E-Bay. It’s actually a “time frame thing” with me, and a TRUE story of MY EXPERIENCE WITH E-BAY AND SECURITY MEASURES TO PROTECT ME. Photo Sharing - Upload Video - Video Sharing Every time a new video from the terrorists comes out, and every time I hear how the FBI cannot find somebody, or Osama Bin Laden is still on the loose, or “we just don’t know where they are”…etc., etc… I think of my E-Bay story and I wonder HOW IT IS THAT E-BAY CAN DO IT, but the United States Government CANNOT. I used to dabble in selling items on E-Bay, but mostly I buy things there. I LOVE E-BAY, even though some consider it the massive Wal-Mart of the universe for Rednecks like me… but ANYTIME I’m looking for any type of obscure item, and I’ve looked in at least three stores and cannot find it readily, I hop onto E-Bay.com and put in a couple of keywords, and like magic I usually find it (usually at a discounted price), and boom… I buy it; I’m on my way, and a happy customer. I AM TRULY A VERY SMALL FISH at E-Bay. I only have about 250 transactions over several years, while many more people have transactions into the several thousands. So I know that as things go, E-Bay could probably care less about me as I am so very low on their E-Bay radar. But oh, NOT TRUE. Most who will read this blog are fairly literate with basic computer terms, but if not I will explain a couple of things. There are e-mails distributed by the thousands called “spoofs” or “phishing” e-mails. These are FAKE e-mails designed by hackers intending to steal your personal identity or account information, but made to look like they are official and come from the owners of a bank, or website like E-Bay. Many of these e-mails are excellent forgeries and it’s easy to be taken if not extremely careful. I am totally anal about computer security, but inevitably, I must have “clicked” on one at some point, because my account and reputation were almost hijacked and compromised at E-Bay. I’m sleeping peacefully in my bed with my husband cuddling at my side one night, and at about 3:00am, YES I SAID 3:00 AM, my phone rings. Scared to death and quite startled I answer the phone expecting to hear some horrible news that usually comes with middle of the night phone calls. IT WAS THE FREAKING SECURITY DEPARTMENT AT E-BAY asking me if I am selling a BMW car at my E-Bay site. Believe it or not, E-Bay has gotten so big; it’s really not uncommon at all for people to sell cars there. I actually know people that have purchased even big rig trucks there. However, a little fish like me usually doesn’t sell them, and E-Bay was smart enough to know that. I explained that NO, I WAS NOT SELLING A CAR… The lady tells me not to worry; it appears that someone has attempted to hijack my identity there. She says to go back to sleep, and apologizes for waking me up so late. E-Bay tells me that they are going to suspend my account completely until the next day. I’m told I will get an e-mail from E-Bay explaining the situation, and she gives me explicit instructions on how to go online and repair the situation later. She assures me that E-Bay will try their hardest to get to the bottom of the matter, and they will inform me later of their findings. Well, long story short… I follow all said instructions and converse again a few times with E-Bay. Within TWO SHORT DAYS… through high tech investigative methods, they find out EXACTLY WHO hijacked my “stuff” by tracing IP addresses, internet protocols, etc. and 86 that person off E-Bay and took measures to protect me, etc. I have continued to use E-Bay from that time with no further problems. My point of all this rambling is this… If E-Bay can find a perpetrator and criminal using a computer and trying to hijack… why can’t the USA government. If these terrorist videos are uploaded to the internet… it should be damn easy to figure out from which computer it came from. I’m just amazed that out of millions of people using E-Bay, little ‘ole me was protected in two days and the villain caught, and the FBI and USA government cannot find one nut job from Southern California that has his 48 minute video all over the internet along with Al Qaeda’s #2 man Ayman al-Zawahiri, and Osama Bin Laden. We should hire the CEO of E-Bay’s IT department to head up Homeland Security!