Over the course of the past year I have noticed more and more auctions listed for high end bicycles that appear to be fraudulent.  What seems to be going on is honest ebay users are having their accounts hijacked and are listing items that just do not seem to match their feedback profiles etc.  These accounts can have little or no feedback to great feedback from honest buying and selling individuals. 

The seaches that I have performed that have yielded fraudulent listings have been for Cervelo, Cannondale and Quintana just to name a few. 

The first thing that stands out is that the listing individual will choose to have a highlighted box on the results page.

Second:  The auction time always seems to be at or around 15hr left when they first appear in a search.

Third:  Great price with no reserve on items that generally sell for much much more.

Fourth:  You must email the "seller" at an address provided within the auction description for a buy it now price and free shipping to anywhere in the world.  They claim that the "ask the seller" email has been not working for them.  Now i have been an ebay user for quite some time and have never had a problem with ebay messeging not working. 

fifth:  Seller will usually have multiple listings with pictures on each listing being the same as the others.  Now what are the chances that the same bike, with the same scratches as noted in the description is being sold on 5 differnt auctions?  Shady!

Sixth:  Look to see what category the item you are looking at is listed in.  This information is located at the top of the auction page just above the auction title.  If they are selling everything they have listed in the category of jewelery>cubic zerconia's, then this would be another sign that it may not be legit.

What you can do. 
1.  Do not email the user at the email address other than ebay messeges.
2.  Do no trust anyone who claims to buy it now without going through the ebay auction.
3.  Look at the sellers feedback and see what they have been buying and selling and see if it's similar to the items located in the "Other items from this seller".  If they have been selling 10cent bead necklaces and teddy bears and are all of a sudden selling 300 thousand dollars in consumer electronics, something is not right.
4.  Report it to ebay by clicking the "Report this item" button located at the bottom of the auction under the (what else you can do line) When you click on this you will have to select what you want to report about.  Your topic should be Listing violations.  Step 1 should be fraudulent listing.  Step 2 should be you suspect a listing is fraud and you didnt bid (least I hope not).  Step 3 should be click to contiue.  Once you continue to the next page you will have to click the email tab which will open a new window with the auction number you are reporting and a spot for you to fill in with what ever you wish to tell ebay. 

Overall please do not get fooled by one of these people.  Help to shut them down.

One last thing to sellers.  If you get an email asking you to verify or if your auction is the same as some www. address, 9 times out of 10, they are sending you a link to a spoof ebay page where they hope that you enter your login information.  In which you will be only turned down on the login and they now have your information.