How to avoid being scammed on Craigs List? Follow the rules...

Slashdot has an Interview With A Craigslist Scammer, and apparently

He ended the interview asking the scammer for any words of advice for readers. The scammer responded: "It's getting harder for business people like me to be successful, but if they [the victims] follow the rules it would be very hard for me to be successful. That's one of the surprises. My friends and I thought we would not be successful for so long, especially with how Craigslist is different now. But there is always someone looking to sell something who doesn't know the game."

Who'da Thunk?

Crowdfunding is a scam, Indiegogo specifically...

Not security specifically, but after the Zano on Kickstarter,  Onogofly on Indiegogo drone debacle,  and others, I realize that crowdfunding is just a wholesale way to sucker people out of their money- as evidence I present:

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/meet-the-pilot-smart-earpiece-language-translator--2#/

I kid you not.  A bable fish.  People want to believe.  As of today May 31st, there are 7771 backers paying $1,765,420 USD  that believe that this is possible.  I hope they understand that creating this using present technology is completely impossible without human interpreters. I hope the backers know that the creators are talented , optimistic dreamers who really want this to work, and that the creators aren't vicious scammers who are buying houses and sports cars with their ponzi-like proceeds.

I completely agree with them that this would be really cool. 

I just hope they won't be disappointed or think there's some sort of nanny-state that's going to protect them.

How are we supposed to protect all the people like this from computer scammers?!
 
At least Paypal is doing something about it - and changed their terms and conditions to exclude "crowdfunding platforms" from their "Purchase Protection" program. 

At best, crowdfunded platforms are Gamblin, at worst, another way to part the well-intentioned from their hard-earned money.

Intuit is accused of deliberately allowing fraudulent returns for increased market share

Brian Krebs writes that Intuit is accused, apparently with proof  like audio, video, or email, that Intuit made the conscious decision to reduce fraud detection when criminals went to their competitors and caused them to lose market share.

http://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/02/turbotaxs-anti-fraud-efforts-under-scrutiny/

Question:  If a criminal files a fraudulent return from a web site , and pays with a percentage of the refund, then the refund can't be recovered, will the web site operator have to return the fee?  What's the penalty?  What if they're found to be doing it deliberately?  Losing their ability to file?

People:  Friends don't let friends overpay their taxes.

Updated! Wikipedia Sockpuppets lead to Scam on paid Wikipedia entries

Very interesting article on the DailyDot talks about a huge (apparent) network of fake people editing wikipedia entries.  It seems to lead to a paid wikipedia  editing service.

It gets really interesting when they discuss that:

1. It's forbidden to edit wikipedia entries for money, and hugely frowned on to edit your own
2. Wikipedia admins  (may) work at some/most/all of the services
3. The kicker - potential clients get their pages modified or deleted before sales calls

Read more here 

Update 10/22/2013:  In Ars Technica, Joe Mullin discusses the deletion of 250 PR-firm-linked user accounts