VAM World Members Begging For Your Help Please

This forum was, previously, one of the most active in reporting ebay coin scams and counterfeits - ebay basically gave the forum admins a backdoor to make such reports directly to an actual human within ebay, who would then take prompt action in getting the fakes delisted and the sellers NARUed. We removed thousands of fake coins before they could be sold. This was all done on a secret opt-in-only subforum so the fake-sellers wouldn't find out, but occasionally, one of the fake-sellers would figure out that it was us doing the reporting and getting their fakes delisted, and they'd threaten us with legal action. We ignored them, and no legal action ever eventuated.

This all stopped in February 2025, when ebay sacked the human, and replaced him with an AI. An AI which is programmed to take seriously ebay's core tenet that "everyone is basically good" and therefore scams and fakes either do not exist or are very very rare. Getting the AI to actually agree with you that a listed fake is actually in violation of ebay's policy is akin to pulling teeth with only your pinky finger - painful, slow, and almost certainly doomed to fail. Being persistent in continuing to report fakes will likely only result in the AI coming to the conclusion that it is you, the reporter, who is the problem for making maliciously false reports and will no longer pay any attention to your complaints.

The number of fakes on ebay has skyrocketed since this forum's fake-reporting capability was eliminated.

This highlights two issues with any proposed plan of action to tackle fakes:

1. Fake-sellers won't just sit there passively letting their corrupt business model be ruined - they'll fight back, trying to discourage anyone who publicly speaks out about them by threatening legal action or otherwise harrassing them - perhaps by infiltrating the fake-reporting group and "report" a bunch of genuine coins listed by reputable sellers.

2. Even if you find a process to eliminate fakes that does manage to work, it will not be permanent, as either ebay decides it's too much hassle dealing with whiny complaining counterfeit-sellers, or it simply isn't cost-effective to keep that door open.


It has always been true that counterfeit coins fall on a spectrum, ranging from "That's so ridiculously, obviously fake even a child or a noob should be able to spot that" to "It looks so real, even museums and experts have already been fooled by them". There are certainly fake coins out there, sitting undetected in museums and collections, awaiting the invention of some as-yet-unknown method of detecting their fakeness.

Modern technology is making it slightly easier to produce such high-quality fakes, but by far the biggest advance has been in global trade and communication, giving the fake-makers instant access to the global market. Most of the fakes are coming from China, and it's perfectly legal in China to make fake American coins. The only people committing crimes are the people who are importing these coins (often unwittingly) into the country. Yes, importing fake coins into America is illegal, but people doing this importing never put "fake coins" on their shipping import label. US Customs doesn't have the budget or manpower to search every single parcel and shipping container coming from China, looking for fake coins.

It is impossible for fake detection and avoidance to be proactive - collectors are always one step behind the fake-masters, as it's much easier to invent a new way of making or selling fake coins than it is to invent a foolproof way of preventing such things from happening.

Thank you both !
I mean that BTW .
This is a nice community

Sure, if it helps.

Yup, there was a fake 2026 silver eagle already on ebay, not presale, from China well below spot price, delivery in two weeks. Last month I reported it to ebay, explained the US Mint hasn't even released them yet and nobody would sell well below melt. ebay AI rejected my concern, did not delist it.

It's now gone, don't know if others complained and it was delisted or the cheating seller sold out.

eBay's AI can't find evidence of a fake coin, even when the title says "NOT REAL".