class action against ali baba?

[kharma]

I am really new to being scammed, and at the moment I feel so angry and powerless.....
I mistakenly thought that Ali Baba was a legitimate website, like ebay. I am surprised to find out that even when Ali Baba are advised that their customers are nothing more than con artists, they continue to promote them as legitimate businesses, even going so far as to reward them with a special staus to enable them to scam more people.
Is there any way a class action can be commenced, surely Ali Baba are responsible for assisting criminals to steal money. If it wasnt for this website I never would have found this company and I never would have been ripped off. Makes me angry to see that a lot of people have also been scammed and Ali baba takes no responsibility.
Is there any legal action that can be taken?

Alibaba are nothing like eBay, the comparison is invalid.

Just because you were scammed does NOT make the site where you made initial contact complicit, nor are they liable for your own due dilligence, or lack thereof. It is down to you the individual to use your own judgement when dealing with international traders on the internet.

If you think you stand a chance, go to a lawyer and ask their advice taking the Terms Of Use of Alibaba along with you; You will need them.

Aledging that a major internet company openly advocates, cooperates and invites scamming operations is the easiest way that YOU will find yourself on the wrong end of the legal process. I suggest very strongly that you back up your allegations with evidence before attemting to use THIS website in some vendetta because you got hurt.

[FW Admin]

Alibaba is in the business of providing a business directory, using their resources to allow business to advertise. There are a great deal of legitimate, non scamming businesses that use Alibaba; some are more prominent (gold etc.) because they pay for it - it's standard business procedure for this particular business field.

Yellow Pages offer the same kind of resources for businesses; most are basic one-line entries that are free of charge - others have a 1 x 1 block, and others a 2 x 2. A few businesses even have full page adverts running.

a) Does that mean by assumption that the ones that advertise on full pages are more effective, or are better, than the single line ones? No, of course not; it just means that they have more money in their budget for advertising and marketing costs.

b) Does it mean that the bigger the adverts, the more likely they are to be scammers? Again, absolutely not; it's simply a more prominent method of putting their business into the public vision.

And, out of the millions of businesses contained in the Yellow Pages resources, there happens to be a few scammers that con people out of their money, does that mean automatically that Yellow Pages are held liable?

I don't think I need answer that one; logic and common sense point to the obvious answer.

[kharma]

I am not meaning to use this site as my own personal vendetta.
I simply want to ask questions and hopefully get some sound advice.
My main point is, if a company is made aware that they are promoting businesses that are involved in criminal activity and fraud - then surely it is their moral responsibility to remove the offending companies and stop advertising them to future victims. There is a law in Australia that makes it illegal to aide criminals. There appear to be a number of companies that have repeatedly defrauded people listed on this website, i saw a list of around 100. ali baba have been informed and yet they still allow them to advertise, damaging their own reputation in the international market place as a result. Doesnt sounds like sound business practise to me, but then iam just a regular person. I accept that there is obviously not a lot of morality in business, but a great reputation and a business built on honesty is surely going to improve ones customer base.
I also accept personal responsiblilty for not adequately investigating my options, being new to all this i was a very easy target. All I want to do is stop this from happening to other people.

[Daneel]

Originally Posted by kharma

My main point is, if a company is made aware that they are promoting businesses that are involved in criminal activity and fraud - then surely it is their moral responsibility to remove the offending companies and stop advertising them to future victims.

I would think so too. When it comes to free members, Alibaba is quite good at removing them when there is reasonable suspicion of fraudulent activity. But for paid members, they will usually respond that they require a court order against the company in order to remove them, and they rarely remove paid members even when they have all the signs of fraud which is quite frustrating.

Originally Posted by kharma

Doesnt sounds like sound business practise to me, but then iam just a regular person.

Yep, and the vast majority who fall for these scams are also eBay traders and one-man businesses, people who have no idea about scams until they fall for one. I suppose it's mostly their reputation in the big business world they care about, not the rantings of the common folks on internet forums.

[btman]

The internet is like a big town without a sheriff. I can imagine that it is so hard to police the internet but with so many billions a year accounted, because of internet fraud you would think that there would be more paid people with the power to take action against these b2b websites or companies that rent out templates to scammers. Until then all we have to are these forums and some kind volunteers.

[Daneel]

As has been mentioned already, legally speaking it is most likely hopeless. When you sign up to Alibaba you sign an agreement to not hold them responsible for any actions by companies on the site, and if you read their disclaimers they tell you that they do not guarantee the legitimacy, or anything else, for paid members. And as a businessman you are expected to read such things, or have a lawyer do it for you.

It's the real scammer you would have to get to, going after Alibaba is still pointless in my opinion as well. The Chinese police have in a few cases been quite helpful in that regard, but they would still need you to come there in person or have a Chinese lawyer, which makes it practically impossible for most.

[kharma]

good news is that ali baba has suspended the account of the company that defrauded me.
That doesnt mean they wont start up under another name, however I am pursuing the company through the appropriate channels.
In fact, i have so many people out after them now I think they will rue the day they started to scam people. Hopefully some time in a nice little prison cell in a third world company will sort them out.
Thank you for all your worldy advice!

[scott321]

I have complained to Alibaba & even though they claim they are not responsible for any "fraud" committed on .... Is there a class action going against Alibaba?

[Dodobird]

Scott321,

Please read Daneel's post.