Honestly this is a great way to lose your money and your new account that you just bought.
You are basically taking a huge gamble if you risk this.
I'm sure many developers log the IP addresses and history of certain accounts and if they see something suspicious they might check and see information changed.
Now I'm not going to say that ALL of the people who do this are crooks, but it might be good to point it out to them and ask them if you can instead buy it properly with a proper licence transfer.
If they INSIST to NOT do this then i would back out as this is very suspicious. I would also report them to a mod as well.
Remember when you properly purchase a "Licence" you now are taking over as the person who now has the "right" to use that software licence from the developers. This is a unique licence code or account number.
Equally remember that you do not OWN the software but instead only OWN the right to use the software as laid out in the product EULA.
So if you are forking over a bunch of money you should definitely make it known to the developer that YOU are now the taking over the "right" to use that software. This is exactly why account transfers are shady.
Now back to those who are trying to sell accounts.
For instance I seen a few Xfer account takeovers even though Xfer does not support it. People have warned them but they continue to sell. This is a major Warning sign for the obvious reasons.
Basically anyone arguing that its ok to break these rules even after being told are being dishonest, and it's definitely something to consider when purchasing from them. However some people might just not be aware of this, so again maybe just ask them.
I would also be cautious when buying from sellers with low feedback scores who are selling stuff for amazing prices. Sometimes there are exceptions but usually i would be extra cautious.
Also be careful where the seller can manually transfer the software from their own account. There are some developers who have systems like this and it is most likely setup to reduce their support workload.
- Native Instruments
- D16 Software
and a few others are like this.
(If anyone else knows of others, feel free to add them to the thread and I will update this list)
Like i said, I think the reason the developer did this is so they can speed up the transfer process by giving the seller control over the transfer process.
For example, say you buy a licence from D16 and want to sell it.
You can go to your account and inside is a form designed to transfer the software to another user.
I don't know how much developer interaction is involved, and if they are super busy they might not check the transfer until much later.
So in the case of a scammer who just bought a licence with a stolen credit card, they can use these systems to flip that stolen licence to someone on KVR marketplace. Once they get a buyer, the scammer might even even convince the buyer to pay with paypals "friends and family" which is even worse for you. (There is a whole sticky on this in the marketplace for more details)
Seriously I think it is much safer to have the developer involved in the transfer process. If you have to pay a small fee think of it as protection for yourself.
NOW one of the MOST important.
Absolutely do not agree to pay a seller with Paypals FRIENDS AND FAMILY GIFT OPTION!!!!
IF you do this, you CANNOT under any circumstances make a case to paypal that you got swindled! They will basically tell you they can't help you.
When you pay a fee to paypal, you are paying for a bit of backup from paypal in case the seller is a scammer.
My story and how i got scammed.
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I personally bought a licence for Molekular a while back, and the seller transferred it to me. It wasn't until quite a bit later that i was told they were scammers and my licence got revoked. By the time I was told it was months later. I told Native Instruments everything, I gave them the email that the person used as well but did not bother going to the police over this because I doubt they would have done much for $50.
I did get to use the software for a bit, but once NI found out that it was a scammer they took the licence from my account. They didn't offer any advice other than to tell me to try and contact paypal and get a refund. This was the same with the Knobcloud admin as well.
So It is absolutely the best idea to ALWAYS buy from developers who MANUALLY check a licence transfer, and again if you have to pay a fee think of it as protection.
The above happened to me on Knobcloud and i wasn't warned until way later (by the admin). So I just don't want anyone else to have to suffer because some scumbag ripped them off.
I also think it would be good to have a Thread that exposes these scams so people learn about them.
Feel free to share your stories here to warn others and stay safe
