craigscrimelist

For those of you who haven’t seen my interview with WCNC in Charlotte the video is here.

If someone knows how to rip the video I would appreciate it.

Also if you think you recognize me from somewhere you’re mistaken.

Craigslist to charge for erotic services ads:

Yesterday I did an interview with Matthew B. Stannard of the San Francisco Chronicle about craigslist’s new security measures. Let’s get my media self-back patting out of the way first.

On the other end of the criticism spectrum was Trench Reynolds, a pseudonymous crime blogger who tracks Craigslist-linked crime at craigscrimelist.org.

“I still say the best way to crack down on that is to do away with the erotic services section altogether,” he said. “I think (the deal) will cut down on a lot of the erotic services ads, but I don’t think it will cut down enough to put me out of business.”

And I still stand by what I said.

Now let’s move on to a quote by craigslist’s CEO himself Jim Buckmaster…

“It raises the accountability for people posting to the category,” said Craigslist Chief Executive Officer Jim Buckmaster. “Our well-intentioned users don’t want to see illegal activity on the site, either.”

Buckmaster said the company is trying to strike a balance, keeping the erotic services section - in part to keep such ads from appearing elsewhere on Craigslist - but trying to do so responsibly, protecting free speech and preventing exploitation. Hopefully, he said, Craigslist can be a pioneer in this kind of cooperation as it has been on the Internet.

“In our humble opinion this is the way to go, and we would invite other online services to follow suit,” he said. “We all would be better off if we all voluntarily do what is necessary to curtail illegal activity on the Internet.”

I keep hearing this theory that if craigslist did away with erotic services that the ads would appear in other parts of the site. Well, if erotic services ads appear in other parts of the site won’t the users then be able to flag them? I mean that’s what Mr. Buckmaster was touting prior to the new measures. Has Mr. Buckmaster lost faith in his user base that he has so highly touted in the past? Or did he never have it to begin with and just wants the traffic that the erotic services section provides?

No sooner did I post my previous post about crauigslist big announcement did I see this post by Jim Buckmaster on craigslist’s official blog.

craigslist is taking huge steps to eliminating crime on its sites.

First off craigslist is suing 14 companies whose service and software are geared towards circumventing craigslist’s existing security measures such as needing a working phone number to place an erotic services ad.

Speaking of erotic services, those ads will now require not only credit card verification but also a small fee with 100% of that money donated to charity.

They have also entered into a new partnership with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to help put a stop to the exploitation of children.

You can read the entire press release at the link I posted above.

Is this the end of crime on craigslist? Is this the end of craigscrimelist? Um…no.

While I applaud the efforts that craigslist is going to they still refuse to eliminate the erotic services section altogether.

While the measures they are putting in place are admirable but still can be circumvented. How many of the new ads will be placed with stolen credit cards?

This is a huge step to eliminating crime on craigslist but unfortunately it is still not enough.

N. Calif. Called Craigslist Crime ‘Hotspot’:

This was an interview I did with TV station KCRA in Sacramento, California about violent crimes and craigslist. Yes, I know they call me Trent Reynolds. That’s more TV friendly than Trench. It’s not like either of those are my real name anyway so there you have it.

I thought I would be going head to head with Jim Buckmaster himself but that turned out not to be. I would have loved to have had that opportunity.

First let me brag about my one and only quote in the article…

Crimes such as stolen items for sale, offers of prostitution and money fraud are much more common. A clearing house for these crimes is found on the Web site craigscrimelist.org — a site where victims can share their Craigslist horror stories.

“I see more crimes reported on the West Coast and in the Pacific Northwest. The big hotspots would be in Northern California,” site developer Trent Reynolds said.

The area is a Craigslist fan base: The site was born just down the road in San Francisco, and Northern California’s in turn use it more and are more likely to become victims.

It’s true. Violent crimes like armed robbery are more rare on craigslist than prostitution and fraud but that doesn’t make it any less of an issue. And Northern California is the epicenter of craigslist related crime since that’s where the site got it’s start and people have been using it longer there than anywhere else.

Now let’s hear from craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster…

According to Jim Buckmaster, CEO of Craigslist, the percentage of postings that end in significant crimes is low when compared with the legitimate use of the site.

Buckmaster claimed Craigslist is unable to track the number of crimes involving the site. He said the task would be daunting, pointing to the 50 million monthly users, 35 million listings and 12 billion monthly pageviews.

“The incidence is not zero. We’d like it be zero, but it’s not zero,” Buckmaster said.

It’s definitely not zero but like I said it’s a large enough number to cause concern yet Mr. Buckmaaster just washes his hands of it and refuses to do anything to protect his userbase.

User profiles, while not a perfect solution, would go a long way to discouraging a lot of crime on craigslist. So would eliminating the erotic services section. Two things that craigslist is not considering. So anonymous crime will continue unabated on craigslist. Eventually people will get so fed up with it they’ll move on to other sites and then the big wigs at craigslist will wonder what happened.

Again, how have they not hired me as a consultant. I’m not above selling out to the man. craigslist and its users see themselves as going against the grain but in reality they’re just another corporation hence they are ‘the man’.

Craigslist website bombarded by crooks, Vancouver expert says:

This is an article from the Canada.com about the amount of real estate scams on craigslist in Canada.

Our good friend Meg at Chicanery, Cons, and Scams is featured in the article and she claims that a good 20 to 40 percent of the rental ads on Vancouver’s craigslist are scams.

Yours truly is featured in the article even though they say I’m from New Jersey. I grew up in Jersey but it’s North Carolina now, but that’s ok.

The point I wanted to make was Jim Buckmaster’s response to Meg’s estimation.

Craigslist’s chief operational officer Jim Buckmaster wouldn’t agree to an interview.

He said in e-mails the percentages “aren’t accurate” but didn’t provide numbers.

“The incidence of illegal ads on Craigslist is actually quite low, especially when compared to the overwhelming volume of legitimate ads, of which there are more than 30 million each month,” he wrote.

He said it’s buyer beware, and noted safety tips are posted online.

Buckmaster said staff screen inappropriate erotic-services ads but won’t ban them as the smaller sites ChosenList.com and flugpo.com do.

He said Craigslist prides itself on co-operating with police.

He seems almost proud that they don’t ban the erotic services ads but that’s not the topic today.

Of course he’s not going to give out exact numbers. First off he probably doesn’t know and that’s because he doesn’t care. As long as the employment scam…I mean job listing money is rolling in he could not give a rat’s ass. He’s right about one thing though when he says ‘Buyer beware’. Buyers should beware and not use craigslist.

The Craigslist Rapist : Guest Blog by Trench Reynolds:

This is a piece I did for the Investigation Discovery blog The Criminal Report Daily that’s run by David Lohr. It focuses on the craigslist rapist Mark Antonio Humphries.

3 men arrested in Web-linked heists:
This is actually an article about three suspects who were arrested for robbing various people in Illinois by placing ads on craigslist seeking items like cell phones and computers. Then when the sellers would meet their would-be buyers they would get robbed.

But we get a little mention at the end of the article.

There is a Web site devoted specifically to crimes committed through Craigslist. The Web site, Craigscrimelist.org, claims no affiliation with Craigslist.org.

Thanks to the Chicago Tribune for the love.

Craigslist or Crimeslist?:
I have to thank Jim Redden of the Portland Tribune for featuring this humble site in his article about craigslist crime in the Portland, Oregon area. It’s a great article and brings up some great points that I’ll discuss later. But now it’s late and for now I just want to brag a little.