A California man who helped funnel stolen cash to a global network of hackers and carders was sentenced Thursday to 6 years in prison for conspiracy to launder money.
Cesar Carranza, 38, also known as “uBuyWeRush,” ran a legitimate business selling liquidation and overstock merchandise online and from three California stores.
But, according to an indictment (.pdf), he also sold MSR-206’s to carders to encode stolen bank card data onto blank cards, and he served as a conduit to transmit stolen money between mules and carders.
He worked with many of the top carders in the criminal underground between 2003 and 2006, including Maksim “Maksik” Yastremskiy, a Ukrainian carder who allegedly worked with TJX hacker Albert Gonzalez and was considered by authorities to be one of the top sellers of stolen card data on the internet.
In 2003 and 2004, Carranza became an approved and trusted vendor on online criminal forums such as CarderPlanet and Shadowcrew, advertising his goods and services and dispensing advice on the best tools to use for various criminal endeavors.
According to court records, he admitted in messages he posted to the forums that he himself had done carding between 1990 and 1998, but retired to become a vendor for other carders.
“I decided to supply all you guys making the real big bucks,” he allegedly wrote. “So if you need me I sell Card Printers, Card Embossers, Tippers, Encoders, Small Readers and more.”
He was first arrested in California in 2004, but was never charged with a crime. Although he was selling MSR-206s through eBay at the time, selling the devices is not illegal. Carranza told Threat Level, however, that police accused him of selling his merchandise to terrorists.
He subsequently sold off his MSR business. But, according to court records, his services as a money launderer for carders continued to flourish, even though it was clear that law enforcement agencies were closely watching him.
Hackers in East Europe and elsewhere would steal credit and debit card numbers and PINs through phishing and other means, then pass the data to so-called mules in the U.S., who would encode the numbers onto the magnetic stripe of blank cards, then use the cards to withdraw money from the accounts at ATMs. They would then send the money back to their co-conspirators in East Europe through Western Union or through e-Gold, an online digital currency.
Authorities say Carranza helped launder about $2.5 million in this way by operating as an e-Gold money exchanger. The mules would give him cash or deposit money into his bank account, and he would either transfer the money to the bank account of another e-Gold exchanger who would convert it to e-Gold for a carder, or he would change the money himself into e-Gold currency through his own e-Gold account, then transfer it to the e-Gold account of carders in East Europe and elsewhere. They would then use a local e-Gold money exchanger to convert the digital fund into their local currency.
One such mule who transmitted stolen money in this way described to Threat Level in 2006 how he obtained hundreds of stolen card numbers from Romanian phishers and Russian hackers that he met online. The man, who used the nickname “John Dillinger,” withdrew more than $150,000 from ATM machines before transferring the money back to East Europe through Western Union and through an e-Gold money exchanger in California.
In addition to laundering stolen funds, authorities say Carranza was a middleman for carders to purchase “dumps” (account and other data stored on a bank card’s magnetic stripe) from one another.
Around January 4, 2006, according to authorities, Carranza transferred about $15,000 worth of e-Gold to the e-Gold account of a carder who went by the nickname “CC-2″ — a known specialist in hacking financial databases and siphoning card data to sell to other criminals. Carranza indicated in a note to the transaction that he was retaining a 6-percent commission for the service. He transferred another $45,000 worth of e-Gold to CC-2’s account over the next two months. In March and April 2006, authorities say he also transferred $33,000 to Maksim Yastremskiy. The latter was arrested in Turkey in 2007 and sentenced to 30 years in prison there and is still wanted in the U.S. for his alleged role in the TJX carding ring.
Between 2003 and 2007, authorities say that more than $2 million went into and out of Carranza’s e-Gold account.
In 2006, e-Gold, under investigation for facilitating money laundering between carders, froze two of Carranza’s e-Gold accounts, which contained about $19,000 at the time. Carranza told Threat Level then that he was considering legal action against e-Gold to release his funds. “I no longer trust the e-gold integrity,” he said. He didn’t follow through on the threat.
He was indicted in 2008 on charges of conspiring to commit access device fraud and money laundering. He pleaded guilty last December to one count of conspiring to launder stolen money.
See also:
- Ukrainian Carding King ‘Maksik’ Was Lured to Arrest
- In Gonzalez Hacking Case, a High-Stakes Fight Over a Ukrainian’s Laptop
- I Was a Cybercrook for the FBI
- Confessions of a Cybermule
- Bullion and Bandits: The Improbable Rise and Fall of E-Gold
- E-Gold Gets Tough on Crime
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.
Name: Off & Away
Quick Pitch: Members bid in auctions on stays in hotel suites for up 99% off retail rates.
Genius Idea: How many five-star hotels have you stayed at? Of those, how many of those stays have been in the resort’s most prestigious suite? And how many of those stays have been for two nights or more? If your answer is greater than zero, then this post isn’t for you, money bags. The rest of us, though, might want to try our hand at the innovative auction site Off & Away.
Off & Away promises unheard of discounts on luxury suites (up to 99% off retail prices) at top resorts in the U.S. and Mexico. These aren’t the economy rooms you can find on other travel sites. There is one giant catch — one that applies to all auction sites, including eBay, the granddaddy of them all. You must be the highest bidder when the auction ends in order to seal the deal.
Off & Away auctions start off cheap to begin with. Each new bid raises the auction price by $0.10, and each auction runs for a limited period of time. Once the time runs out, the highest bidder wins the auction. The process sounds simple enough, but Off & Away throws a few curve balls into the typical online auction format, making the auction experience a quirky ride that will likely get your blood pumping.
First, you’ll need to buy bids if you want to participate in auctions. Each bid costs $1.00, and you can buy as many or as few as you want. You can then use these bids during actions, but you’ll want to keep in mind that each bid is essentially costing you a buck.
Off & Away gets especially interesting when a hotel deal is just seconds away from going to the highest bidder; this is when the hidden bidders come out to play. Once the auction reaches the final two minutes, each new bid resets the countdown clock to 20 seconds and raises the auction price by $0.10.
Let’s say a resort stay is ready to go to the highest bidder for $49.50 with just seconds left on the clock. A lurking user could pop in with one second remaining, submit a bid, reset the clock to 20 seconds and raise the price to $49.60. Bidding continues until the rest of the bidders give up and allow the auction clock to run down to zero.
To say the formula is a catalyst for frenzied competition between stubborn bidders holding out for the best deal till the very end is a huge understatement. In my own experiences, the bidding competition that happens in the last few seconds can extend an auction for hours — it’s an exciting, adrenaline-enthused experience that often results in disappointment. Most of these hotel deals are so remarkable that your desire to win will outweigh the potential risk of defeat.
The good news is that your used bids don’t completely go to waste. Each used bid can be applied towards $1.10 off another room at the resort in question. You’re obviously not getting the suite experience with these standard room offers, but it’s still a decent consolation prize.
But Can You Really Win?
I’ve tried my hand at a few auctions to no avail. Just the possibility of a win is enticing enough to lure me in and compel me to use my prepaid bids, but I’ve yet to reach the finish line. I’ll keep trying though, and that’s in no small part due to the genius formula cooked up by CEO Doug Aley and team.
Aley assures me that eventually I will win — and that you will too. Earlier today he penned a blog post with tips on how to win. He recommends picking auctions that are less competitive and strategizing ahead of time about how and when to bid. Of course, he also recommends stocking up on bids, but that’s a no-brainer strategy that also works to the startup’s advantage.
Off & Away’s continued success will be dependent on helping more users win. After all, who wants to spend money to buy bids that essentially just go wasted?
Risk Versus Reward for Hotels
The quality of hotel stays offered through Off & Away is impressive to say the least — these hotels are the hotels we only dream about staying at. With the price of sale totally dependent on site users, we questioned Aley about the risk-reward potential for hotels who use the service.
“We have special deals worked out with our hotel partners that ensure that they don’t field any of the risk. Beyond that, our hotel partners and customers know that just because an auction goes for an incredibly inexpensive price doesn’t mean there weren’t a lot of people lurking that were interested in the room. Many times, we have a group of people that are just ’saving their bullets’ for what they think is the end of the auction, only to see their chance to bid slip away,” explains Aley.
Off & Away is a Seattle-based startup that’s raised $1.35 million from Madrona Venture Group and additional private investors. The site’s pedigree includes a staff of travel veterans from Amazon and Orbitz. As the startup evolves, look for it to reduce total auction length and introduce better ways for members to apply bids used on lost auctions for better deals.
Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark
BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.
For more Tech coverage:
benchcraft company portland or
Small Business <b>News</b>: Social Media Mavens
Social media has created a new vocabulary for small business, a vocabulary that encompasses not only marketing but networking and collaborating as well.
Thinking Anglicans: Ordinariate <b>news</b>
Ordinariate news. According to the Catholic Herald Bishop of Fulham to take up Ordinariate. The Anglican bishop of Fulham and the chairman of Forward in Faith International has announced he will resign before the end of the year to join ...
This Week in Credit Card <b>News</b> - MoneyBuilder - making sense of <b>...</b>
Discover Says US Antitrust Settlement Won't Help Consumers Discover says US consumers may not benefit from an antitrust settlement that lets merchants offer rewards and incentives to people who pay with lower-cost credit cards.
bench craft company reviews
A California man who helped funnel stolen cash to a global network of hackers and carders was sentenced Thursday to 6 years in prison for conspiracy to launder money.
Cesar Carranza, 38, also known as “uBuyWeRush,” ran a legitimate business selling liquidation and overstock merchandise online and from three California stores.
But, according to an indictment (.pdf), he also sold MSR-206’s to carders to encode stolen bank card data onto blank cards, and he served as a conduit to transmit stolen money between mules and carders.
He worked with many of the top carders in the criminal underground between 2003 and 2006, including Maksim “Maksik” Yastremskiy, a Ukrainian carder who allegedly worked with TJX hacker Albert Gonzalez and was considered by authorities to be one of the top sellers of stolen card data on the internet.
In 2003 and 2004, Carranza became an approved and trusted vendor on online criminal forums such as CarderPlanet and Shadowcrew, advertising his goods and services and dispensing advice on the best tools to use for various criminal endeavors.
According to court records, he admitted in messages he posted to the forums that he himself had done carding between 1990 and 1998, but retired to become a vendor for other carders.
“I decided to supply all you guys making the real big bucks,” he allegedly wrote. “So if you need me I sell Card Printers, Card Embossers, Tippers, Encoders, Small Readers and more.”
He was first arrested in California in 2004, but was never charged with a crime. Although he was selling MSR-206s through eBay at the time, selling the devices is not illegal. Carranza told Threat Level, however, that police accused him of selling his merchandise to terrorists.
He subsequently sold off his MSR business. But, according to court records, his services as a money launderer for carders continued to flourish, even though it was clear that law enforcement agencies were closely watching him.
Hackers in East Europe and elsewhere would steal credit and debit card numbers and PINs through phishing and other means, then pass the data to so-called mules in the U.S., who would encode the numbers onto the magnetic stripe of blank cards, then use the cards to withdraw money from the accounts at ATMs. They would then send the money back to their co-conspirators in East Europe through Western Union or through e-Gold, an online digital currency.
Authorities say Carranza helped launder about $2.5 million in this way by operating as an e-Gold money exchanger. The mules would give him cash or deposit money into his bank account, and he would either transfer the money to the bank account of another e-Gold exchanger who would convert it to e-Gold for a carder, or he would change the money himself into e-Gold currency through his own e-Gold account, then transfer it to the e-Gold account of carders in East Europe and elsewhere. They would then use a local e-Gold money exchanger to convert the digital fund into their local currency.
One such mule who transmitted stolen money in this way described to Threat Level in 2006 how he obtained hundreds of stolen card numbers from Romanian phishers and Russian hackers that he met online. The man, who used the nickname “John Dillinger,” withdrew more than $150,000 from ATM machines before transferring the money back to East Europe through Western Union and through an e-Gold money exchanger in California.
In addition to laundering stolen funds, authorities say Carranza was a middleman for carders to purchase “dumps” (account and other data stored on a bank card’s magnetic stripe) from one another.
Around January 4, 2006, according to authorities, Carranza transferred about $15,000 worth of e-Gold to the e-Gold account of a carder who went by the nickname “CC-2″ — a known specialist in hacking financial databases and siphoning card data to sell to other criminals. Carranza indicated in a note to the transaction that he was retaining a 6-percent commission for the service. He transferred another $45,000 worth of e-Gold to CC-2’s account over the next two months. In March and April 2006, authorities say he also transferred $33,000 to Maksim Yastremskiy. The latter was arrested in Turkey in 2007 and sentenced to 30 years in prison there and is still wanted in the U.S. for his alleged role in the TJX carding ring.
Between 2003 and 2007, authorities say that more than $2 million went into and out of Carranza’s e-Gold account.
In 2006, e-Gold, under investigation for facilitating money laundering between carders, froze two of Carranza’s e-Gold accounts, which contained about $19,000 at the time. Carranza told Threat Level then that he was considering legal action against e-Gold to release his funds. “I no longer trust the e-gold integrity,” he said. He didn’t follow through on the threat.
He was indicted in 2008 on charges of conspiring to commit access device fraud and money laundering. He pleaded guilty last December to one count of conspiring to launder stolen money.
See also:
- Ukrainian Carding King ‘Maksik’ Was Lured to Arrest
- In Gonzalez Hacking Case, a High-Stakes Fight Over a Ukrainian’s Laptop
- I Was a Cybercrook for the FBI
- Confessions of a Cybermule
- Bullion and Bandits: The Improbable Rise and Fall of E-Gold
- E-Gold Gets Tough on Crime
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.
Name: Off & Away
Quick Pitch: Members bid in auctions on stays in hotel suites for up 99% off retail rates.
Genius Idea: How many five-star hotels have you stayed at? Of those, how many of those stays have been in the resort’s most prestigious suite? And how many of those stays have been for two nights or more? If your answer is greater than zero, then this post isn’t for you, money bags. The rest of us, though, might want to try our hand at the innovative auction site Off & Away.
Off & Away promises unheard of discounts on luxury suites (up to 99% off retail prices) at top resorts in the U.S. and Mexico. These aren’t the economy rooms you can find on other travel sites. There is one giant catch — one that applies to all auction sites, including eBay, the granddaddy of them all. You must be the highest bidder when the auction ends in order to seal the deal.
Off & Away auctions start off cheap to begin with. Each new bid raises the auction price by $0.10, and each auction runs for a limited period of time. Once the time runs out, the highest bidder wins the auction. The process sounds simple enough, but Off & Away throws a few curve balls into the typical online auction format, making the auction experience a quirky ride that will likely get your blood pumping.
First, you’ll need to buy bids if you want to participate in auctions. Each bid costs $1.00, and you can buy as many or as few as you want. You can then use these bids during actions, but you’ll want to keep in mind that each bid is essentially costing you a buck.
Off & Away gets especially interesting when a hotel deal is just seconds away from going to the highest bidder; this is when the hidden bidders come out to play. Once the auction reaches the final two minutes, each new bid resets the countdown clock to 20 seconds and raises the auction price by $0.10.
Let’s say a resort stay is ready to go to the highest bidder for $49.50 with just seconds left on the clock. A lurking user could pop in with one second remaining, submit a bid, reset the clock to 20 seconds and raise the price to $49.60. Bidding continues until the rest of the bidders give up and allow the auction clock to run down to zero.
To say the formula is a catalyst for frenzied competition between stubborn bidders holding out for the best deal till the very end is a huge understatement. In my own experiences, the bidding competition that happens in the last few seconds can extend an auction for hours — it’s an exciting, adrenaline-enthused experience that often results in disappointment. Most of these hotel deals are so remarkable that your desire to win will outweigh the potential risk of defeat.
The good news is that your used bids don’t completely go to waste. Each used bid can be applied towards $1.10 off another room at the resort in question. You’re obviously not getting the suite experience with these standard room offers, but it’s still a decent consolation prize.
But Can You Really Win?
I’ve tried my hand at a few auctions to no avail. Just the possibility of a win is enticing enough to lure me in and compel me to use my prepaid bids, but I’ve yet to reach the finish line. I’ll keep trying though, and that’s in no small part due to the genius formula cooked up by CEO Doug Aley and team.
Aley assures me that eventually I will win — and that you will too. Earlier today he penned a blog post with tips on how to win. He recommends picking auctions that are less competitive and strategizing ahead of time about how and when to bid. Of course, he also recommends stocking up on bids, but that’s a no-brainer strategy that also works to the startup’s advantage.
Off & Away’s continued success will be dependent on helping more users win. After all, who wants to spend money to buy bids that essentially just go wasted?
Risk Versus Reward for Hotels
The quality of hotel stays offered through Off & Away is impressive to say the least — these hotels are the hotels we only dream about staying at. With the price of sale totally dependent on site users, we questioned Aley about the risk-reward potential for hotels who use the service.
“We have special deals worked out with our hotel partners that ensure that they don’t field any of the risk. Beyond that, our hotel partners and customers know that just because an auction goes for an incredibly inexpensive price doesn’t mean there weren’t a lot of people lurking that were interested in the room. Many times, we have a group of people that are just ’saving their bullets’ for what they think is the end of the auction, only to see their chance to bid slip away,” explains Aley.
Off & Away is a Seattle-based startup that’s raised $1.35 million from Madrona Venture Group and additional private investors. The site’s pedigree includes a staff of travel veterans from Amazon and Orbitz. As the startup evolves, look for it to reduce total auction length and introduce better ways for members to apply bids used on lost auctions for better deals.
Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark
BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.
For more Tech coverage:
benchcraft company portland or
Small Business <b>News</b>: Social Media Mavens
Social media has created a new vocabulary for small business, a vocabulary that encompasses not only marketing but networking and collaborating as well.
Thinking Anglicans: Ordinariate <b>news</b>
Ordinariate news. According to the Catholic Herald Bishop of Fulham to take up Ordinariate. The Anglican bishop of Fulham and the chairman of Forward in Faith International has announced he will resign before the end of the year to join ...
This Week in Credit Card <b>News</b> - MoneyBuilder - making sense of <b>...</b>
Discover Says US Antitrust Settlement Won't Help Consumers Discover says US consumers may not benefit from an antitrust settlement that lets merchants offer rewards and incentives to people who pay with lower-cost credit cards.
benchcraft company scam
benchcraft company scam
benchcraft company scam
Small Business <b>News</b>: Social Media Mavens
Social media has created a new vocabulary for small business, a vocabulary that encompasses not only marketing but networking and collaborating as well.
Thinking Anglicans: Ordinariate <b>news</b>
Ordinariate news. According to the Catholic Herald Bishop of Fulham to take up Ordinariate. The Anglican bishop of Fulham and the chairman of Forward in Faith International has announced he will resign before the end of the year to join ...
This Week in Credit Card <b>News</b> - MoneyBuilder - making sense of <b>...</b>
Discover Says US Antitrust Settlement Won't Help Consumers Discover says US consumers may not benefit from an antitrust settlement that lets merchants offer rewards and incentives to people who pay with lower-cost credit cards.
benchcraft company scam
A California man who helped funnel stolen cash to a global network of hackers and carders was sentenced Thursday to 6 years in prison for conspiracy to launder money.
Cesar Carranza, 38, also known as “uBuyWeRush,” ran a legitimate business selling liquidation and overstock merchandise online and from three California stores.
But, according to an indictment (.pdf), he also sold MSR-206’s to carders to encode stolen bank card data onto blank cards, and he served as a conduit to transmit stolen money between mules and carders.
He worked with many of the top carders in the criminal underground between 2003 and 2006, including Maksim “Maksik” Yastremskiy, a Ukrainian carder who allegedly worked with TJX hacker Albert Gonzalez and was considered by authorities to be one of the top sellers of stolen card data on the internet.
In 2003 and 2004, Carranza became an approved and trusted vendor on online criminal forums such as CarderPlanet and Shadowcrew, advertising his goods and services and dispensing advice on the best tools to use for various criminal endeavors.
According to court records, he admitted in messages he posted to the forums that he himself had done carding between 1990 and 1998, but retired to become a vendor for other carders.
“I decided to supply all you guys making the real big bucks,” he allegedly wrote. “So if you need me I sell Card Printers, Card Embossers, Tippers, Encoders, Small Readers and more.”
He was first arrested in California in 2004, but was never charged with a crime. Although he was selling MSR-206s through eBay at the time, selling the devices is not illegal. Carranza told Threat Level, however, that police accused him of selling his merchandise to terrorists.
He subsequently sold off his MSR business. But, according to court records, his services as a money launderer for carders continued to flourish, even though it was clear that law enforcement agencies were closely watching him.
Hackers in East Europe and elsewhere would steal credit and debit card numbers and PINs through phishing and other means, then pass the data to so-called mules in the U.S., who would encode the numbers onto the magnetic stripe of blank cards, then use the cards to withdraw money from the accounts at ATMs. They would then send the money back to their co-conspirators in East Europe through Western Union or through e-Gold, an online digital currency.
Authorities say Carranza helped launder about $2.5 million in this way by operating as an e-Gold money exchanger. The mules would give him cash or deposit money into his bank account, and he would either transfer the money to the bank account of another e-Gold exchanger who would convert it to e-Gold for a carder, or he would change the money himself into e-Gold currency through his own e-Gold account, then transfer it to the e-Gold account of carders in East Europe and elsewhere. They would then use a local e-Gold money exchanger to convert the digital fund into their local currency.
One such mule who transmitted stolen money in this way described to Threat Level in 2006 how he obtained hundreds of stolen card numbers from Romanian phishers and Russian hackers that he met online. The man, who used the nickname “John Dillinger,” withdrew more than $150,000 from ATM machines before transferring the money back to East Europe through Western Union and through an e-Gold money exchanger in California.
In addition to laundering stolen funds, authorities say Carranza was a middleman for carders to purchase “dumps” (account and other data stored on a bank card’s magnetic stripe) from one another.
Around January 4, 2006, according to authorities, Carranza transferred about $15,000 worth of e-Gold to the e-Gold account of a carder who went by the nickname “CC-2″ — a known specialist in hacking financial databases and siphoning card data to sell to other criminals. Carranza indicated in a note to the transaction that he was retaining a 6-percent commission for the service. He transferred another $45,000 worth of e-Gold to CC-2’s account over the next two months. In March and April 2006, authorities say he also transferred $33,000 to Maksim Yastremskiy. The latter was arrested in Turkey in 2007 and sentenced to 30 years in prison there and is still wanted in the U.S. for his alleged role in the TJX carding ring.
Between 2003 and 2007, authorities say that more than $2 million went into and out of Carranza’s e-Gold account.
In 2006, e-Gold, under investigation for facilitating money laundering between carders, froze two of Carranza’s e-Gold accounts, which contained about $19,000 at the time. Carranza told Threat Level then that he was considering legal action against e-Gold to release his funds. “I no longer trust the e-gold integrity,” he said. He didn’t follow through on the threat.
He was indicted in 2008 on charges of conspiring to commit access device fraud and money laundering. He pleaded guilty last December to one count of conspiring to launder stolen money.
See also:
- Ukrainian Carding King ‘Maksik’ Was Lured to Arrest
- In Gonzalez Hacking Case, a High-Stakes Fight Over a Ukrainian’s Laptop
- I Was a Cybercrook for the FBI
- Confessions of a Cybermule
- Bullion and Bandits: The Improbable Rise and Fall of E-Gold
- E-Gold Gets Tough on Crime
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.
Name: Off & Away
Quick Pitch: Members bid in auctions on stays in hotel suites for up 99% off retail rates.
Genius Idea: How many five-star hotels have you stayed at? Of those, how many of those stays have been in the resort’s most prestigious suite? And how many of those stays have been for two nights or more? If your answer is greater than zero, then this post isn’t for you, money bags. The rest of us, though, might want to try our hand at the innovative auction site Off & Away.
Off & Away promises unheard of discounts on luxury suites (up to 99% off retail prices) at top resorts in the U.S. and Mexico. These aren’t the economy rooms you can find on other travel sites. There is one giant catch — one that applies to all auction sites, including eBay, the granddaddy of them all. You must be the highest bidder when the auction ends in order to seal the deal.
Off & Away auctions start off cheap to begin with. Each new bid raises the auction price by $0.10, and each auction runs for a limited period of time. Once the time runs out, the highest bidder wins the auction. The process sounds simple enough, but Off & Away throws a few curve balls into the typical online auction format, making the auction experience a quirky ride that will likely get your blood pumping.
First, you’ll need to buy bids if you want to participate in auctions. Each bid costs $1.00, and you can buy as many or as few as you want. You can then use these bids during actions, but you’ll want to keep in mind that each bid is essentially costing you a buck.
Off & Away gets especially interesting when a hotel deal is just seconds away from going to the highest bidder; this is when the hidden bidders come out to play. Once the auction reaches the final two minutes, each new bid resets the countdown clock to 20 seconds and raises the auction price by $0.10.
Let’s say a resort stay is ready to go to the highest bidder for $49.50 with just seconds left on the clock. A lurking user could pop in with one second remaining, submit a bid, reset the clock to 20 seconds and raise the price to $49.60. Bidding continues until the rest of the bidders give up and allow the auction clock to run down to zero.
To say the formula is a catalyst for frenzied competition between stubborn bidders holding out for the best deal till the very end is a huge understatement. In my own experiences, the bidding competition that happens in the last few seconds can extend an auction for hours — it’s an exciting, adrenaline-enthused experience that often results in disappointment. Most of these hotel deals are so remarkable that your desire to win will outweigh the potential risk of defeat.
The good news is that your used bids don’t completely go to waste. Each used bid can be applied towards $1.10 off another room at the resort in question. You’re obviously not getting the suite experience with these standard room offers, but it’s still a decent consolation prize.
But Can You Really Win?
I’ve tried my hand at a few auctions to no avail. Just the possibility of a win is enticing enough to lure me in and compel me to use my prepaid bids, but I’ve yet to reach the finish line. I’ll keep trying though, and that’s in no small part due to the genius formula cooked up by CEO Doug Aley and team.
Aley assures me that eventually I will win — and that you will too. Earlier today he penned a blog post with tips on how to win. He recommends picking auctions that are less competitive and strategizing ahead of time about how and when to bid. Of course, he also recommends stocking up on bids, but that’s a no-brainer strategy that also works to the startup’s advantage.
Off & Away’s continued success will be dependent on helping more users win. After all, who wants to spend money to buy bids that essentially just go wasted?
Risk Versus Reward for Hotels
The quality of hotel stays offered through Off & Away is impressive to say the least — these hotels are the hotels we only dream about staying at. With the price of sale totally dependent on site users, we questioned Aley about the risk-reward potential for hotels who use the service.
“We have special deals worked out with our hotel partners that ensure that they don’t field any of the risk. Beyond that, our hotel partners and customers know that just because an auction goes for an incredibly inexpensive price doesn’t mean there weren’t a lot of people lurking that were interested in the room. Many times, we have a group of people that are just ’saving their bullets’ for what they think is the end of the auction, only to see their chance to bid slip away,” explains Aley.
Off & Away is a Seattle-based startup that’s raised $1.35 million from Madrona Venture Group and additional private investors. The site’s pedigree includes a staff of travel veterans from Amazon and Orbitz. As the startup evolves, look for it to reduce total auction length and introduce better ways for members to apply bids used on lost auctions for better deals.
Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark
BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.
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eBay is huge, thousands upon thousands of products are listed on a hourly basis. So how do you find your niche. How do you find a product, or perhaps even products that are going to sell on eBay and make you money. The only bad bit of news is that most products that currently exist in the Worlds marketplace are currently being sold on eBay, BUT that doesn't mean you can't reinvent the wheel. You could look at what sellers are currently offering and see how and where you could compete with them. Find a product you are interested in, research where you can get it from, and how much it will cost you to list it, buy it and send it out if it sells.
From this stage you can work out how to find your niche on eBay, for example will it be offering add on's that no one else does. Offering same day/guaranteed next day delivery or similar. Find something that is going to differentiate you from your competitors and put it into action.
Once you have decided what you want to sell on eBay and where you will get it from then decide as soon as you can what your USP (Unique selling point) is going to be. What are you going to do, offer or sell that your competitors are not.
And remember that just because a marketplace is saturated or heaving with competition, it doesn't mean that there is not room for one or two more.
Below are just a couple of top tips and ideas as to how you can find your money making niche on eBay:
1. Start browsing and searching eBay for items you are interested in. Perhaps you have a hobby you would like to make money from, or perhaps you have specialist knowledge in an area such as toys and dolls. Whatever you fancy doing, see if you can find it on eBay and if so who's doing it and what they are doing.
2. Ask around. Ask friends, families, work colleagues and so on what they look for on eBay, perhaps there are items that they want that they simply cannot find - could these items form your niche?
Patience, research and time are all key elements when it comes down to finding your niche on eBay and making money, so stick with it and it should pay off.
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