Fake: Forgery, Lies, & eBay - Hardcover

Walton, Kenneth

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1416907114 ISBN 13: 9781416907114

Publisher: Simon Spotlight Entertainment, 2006

Synopsis

A behind-the-scenes account of an art scam through which con artists used eBay's then-unpoliced auction system to manipulate bidders out of large quantities of money traces the author's transformation from an art trader to an Internet fraudster, shares the stories of high-profile scammers and victims, and describes how their activities changed eBay policies. 50,000 first printing.

About this title

About the Author

Kenneth Walton was a lawyer when he began selling art on eBay in 1999. Over time his online sales tactics grew increasingly fraudulent, culminating in the $135,805 sale of a forged Richard Diebenkorn painting in May 2000. The story of this infamous auction, first broken by an investigative report published in the New York Times, ultimately resulted in his prosecution by the federal government for placing shill bids. He was sentenced in June 2004, is no longer a lawyer, and lives in Northern California. This is his first book. You can visit his website at www.kennethwalton.com.

Reviews

In November 1998, Walton was a bored, unproductive 31-year-old Sacramento attorney when a "boorish" army buddy, Ken Fetterman, showed him his eBay art auctions on the Internet, gave him a five-minute tutorial on "the world's largest flea market" and cut Walton in on an auction that doubled his $400 investment. Soon Walton was frequenting thrift stores, making shill bids to raise the price on his own and Fetterman's auctions and selling paintings with signatures he strongly suspected were doctored by Fetterman, even allowing one buyer to think he'd landed a Giacometti. When Walton forges Richard Diebenkorn's signature on a painting that auctions for $135,805 in May 2000, the result is front-page coverage in the New York Times and an FBI investigation. The amoral slacker loses friends, lovers and his law license. eBay bans him for life; he pleads guilty to a felony and gets probation. Walton is humbled but gains a conscience, a pure love of art and a passion for computer programming. This engrossing morality tale is also a primer on how to commit Internet fraud, an indictment of eBay and its lackadaisical attitudes about crime, as well as a sad commentary on society where art is a commodity to be bought sight unseen by the greedy and foolish. (May)
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Edition details

• Publisher: Simon Spotlight Entertainment
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1416907114
• ISBN 13: 9781416907114
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 304