eBay To Make Changes to the Message System:

Hi…I'm Rob Chesnut, and I'm the head of eBay's global Trust & Safety
organization. By now, I think the entire eBay community is familiar with
the problem of spoof/phishing emails, and I'm sure that many of you have
gotten one or more of these fraudulent messages in your home or business
email account over the last year. Spoof emails have become a serious
problem for banks and major ecommerce sites, and they are a significant
threat to ecommerce globally. They are crafted by bad guys and appear to
come from a trusted source, such as your bank, your ISP, or eBay itself.
They often contain all the correct logos and headers that give them the
appearance of legitimacy. These emails usually contain some “call to
action,” some urgency designed to trick users into clicking a link that
takes them to a legitimate-looking website where they enter their personal
financial information and passwords.

As the sophistication of these emails has increased, it has become evident
that we all need help to weed out these fraudulent emails from our
systems. Over the last year, eBay has rolled out one industry-leading
product, the eBay Toolbar with Account Guard, that helps protect users
from spoof sites by alerting users whenever they are about to go to a
spoof eBay or PayPal site. If you don't have the eBay Toolbar, I strongly
urge you to go to the eBay Security & Resolution Center and download it
today.

But it's clear that we need to do more. That's why I'm particularly happy
to announce that eBay will be rolling out one of our most effective
measures to combat spoof – the second phase of My Messages (available in
My eBay). With the second phase of My Messages, launching in late June,
you can trust that important eBay account-related messages you receive in
My Messages will be legitimate.

From a safety perspective, the bottom line is this – If the email affects
your eBay account, it's in My Messages. If you get an email that looks
like it's from eBay about a problem with your account or requests personal
information and it's not in My Messages, it's a fake email. Please forward
it to spoof@ebay.com.

The initial phase of My Messages, launched earlier this year, has been a
read-only Inbox for members to receive information about buying, selling,
and other activities and events on eBay. This second phase of My Messages
allows for two-way communication with eBay and with other eBay members.
Soon you'll start receiving:

important account-related messages (e.g. billing invoices, password change
notices, and other Trust & Safety messages),
Customer Support responses and
member-to-member communications
… ALL in your My Messages Inbox. This will ensure you never miss an
important message because of spam blockers or a full email box.
Additionally, you will continue to get a copy of these communications to
your registered email address.

Since upgrading My Messages is a large, global project, you'll start
noticing some visual changes to My Messages in a few days – folders/folder
management, consolidated views of all unread messages, the ability to
forward a message to your address, and other changes. However, the bulk of
the new features (and all of the new messages) will not be available until
late June. We'll keep you updated on progress on the General Announcements
board.

I hope you will take some time to become familiar with the upcoming
changes to My Messages by reading our Frequently Asked Questions and
taking the My Messages tour. As always, we value and welcome your ongoing
feedback and we hope you'll let us know your thoughts on the My eBay
discussion board. While we're not able to respond to all comments
directly, they will be read and considered for future enhancements. The My
Messages team will also be hosting a workshop after the launch to review
the new features and answer member questions, so stay tuned for more
details.

Sincerely,

Rob Chesnut
Senior Vice President, Trust & Safety