A scam is spreading on secondhand trading platforms in which a seller who agreed to meet in person demands payment first as soon as the buyer arrives. According to a Newsis report, a post titled "A secondhand trading scam that's apparently popular these days" appeared on social media on the 19th. The seller had first proposed a face-to-face deal, but once the buyer arrived in front of the apartment building, the seller said something urgent had come up and the item had been hung on the front door. The seller then said that if the buyer transferred the payment first, the seller would give out the code to the building's shared entrance.
When the buyer said they would pay after seeing the item, the seller insisted there was no problem because the product was unopened and the receipt was included. In the end, the buyer refused the deal. The person who wrote the post suspected that the building and unit number the seller gave might not be a real home, and that the photo of the item hanging on the door might also have been faked. It is a scheme that preys on the reluctance of a buyer who has come a long way to leave empty-handed.
A so-called "doorknob deal" is a contactless method in which the seller hangs the item on the door and the buyer picks it up. It is convenient, but it has a weakness: checking the item and paying for it do not happen at the same time and place. Let us look at how the law responds to transactions that exploit this weakness.
1. Why This Scheme Is Dangerous
A. The simultaneous exchange breaks down
A face-to-face deal is safe because the item and the money change hands at the same spot. If you do not like the item when you see it, you simply do not send the money. But the demand to "pay first and I'll give you the code" reverses that order. The money goes out first, while the item sits behind a door you cannot check. The moment the transfer is complete, whatever bargaining power the buyer had disappears.
B. Already being on site clouds judgment
Someone who has already spent time and travel costs to reach the meeting place finds it hard to back out. The apartment building in front of them, the unopened product, and the mention of a receipt are all devices to ease that hesitation. In reality, the seller may not live in that building, or the item may not exist at all.
2. Punishable Even If No Money Was Received
A. When fraud is established
Article 347(1) of the Criminal Act punishes a person who deceives another and thereby obtains delivery of property or acquires a pecuniary advantage by imprisonment for not more than 20 years or a fine not exceeding 50 million won. Receiving money by falsely claiming the item has been hung on the door, with no intention of handing it over from the outset, is classic fraud. The courts interpret deception broadly.
Supreme Court Decision 2017Do1405, April 26, 2017
Deception in fraud includes every act, whether active or passive, that betrays the duty of good faith and sincerity that parties to a property transaction owe one another.
Not only sending fake photos or giving out the building and unit number of someone else's home, but also pressing for payment while concealing that the item does not exist, may amount to deception.
B. Attempts and habitual offenses are also punished
Even if, as in this case, the buyer refused to pay and no money changed hands, that is not the end of it. Article 352 of the Criminal Act punishes attempted fraud. If the same scheme was repeated against several people, the sentence may be increased by up to one half as habitual fraud under Article 351 of the Criminal Act. In secondhand trading scams, one person often multiplies victims through multiple accounts and bank accounts, so it is common for several cases to be combined into one at the investigation stage.
3. Can You Get the Money Back?
A. Unlike voice phishing, an account freeze is difficult
Many victims assume that, as with voice phishing, a call to the bank will freeze the account right away. However, Article 2, Subparagraph 2 of the Special Act on the Prevention of Telecommunications-Based Financial Fraud and Refund of Fraudulently Obtained Assets excludes "acts disguised as the supply of goods or the provision of services" from telecommunications-based financial fraud. This means that secondhand trading fraud, in which the scammer pretends to sell an item, is in principle not subject to that Act's payment-suspension and refund procedures. In the end, the money must be pursued through investigation, trial, and civil proceedings.
B. Apply for a compensation order in the criminal trial
Article 25 of the Act on Special Cases Concerning Expedition of Legal Proceedings (the “Legal Proceedings Expedition Act”, 소송촉진법) allows a court, when sentencing a defendant for crimes such as fraud, to order compensation for direct material damage caused by the crime upon the victim's application. In effect, it opens a way to receive compensation together with the criminal judgment without filing a separate civil suit. However, a compensation order will not be issued if the amount of damage is not specified or the scope of liability is unclear, so the amount of damage must be organized precisely using transfer records and chat logs.
C. Sellers can also get caught up in someone else's fraud
In secondhand trading, a seller sometimes ends up in the middle of an unrelated fraud case. The scammer deceives another victim into sending money to the seller's account and simply walks away with the item. The Supreme Court sided with the seller in such a case.
Supreme Court Decision 2024Da216187, June 27, 2024
Where a creditor who received repayment of a debt with defrauded money neither knew of that fact nor was grossly negligent, there is a legal ground for the receipt even in relation to the victim.
In that case, the seller sold a pure gold necklace through a secondhand trading site and received the payment, but the money had been moved by a voice phishing criminal from another person's account. The Supreme Court reversed the lower court, which had found a duty to return the money, holding that it was difficult to conclude that the seller knew or was grossly negligent in not knowing. That is no reason to let your guard down, however. If the name of the person who sent the money differs from that of your trading partner, the habit of checking once more before handing over the item prevents disputes.
4. What to Check Before and After a Deal
A. Before the deal
Sticking to a single rule, sending money only after checking the item in person, can prevent most of the harm. A sudden request on the day of the meeting to switch to a contactless deal, an offer to reveal a door code or location on condition of prepayment, and high-end goods priced far below market should all trigger suspicion first. If the platform offers a secure payment feature, use it, and it is also worth checking in advance whether the other party's account number or contact details have a history of fraud reports.
B. If you have already sent money
Before the seller deletes the account, capture the listing, the chat history, the other party's profile, the account number, and the transfer records. Report the matter to the platform's customer center and ask it to preserve the account information, and report the fraud to the police or file a criminal complaint. If it turns out there are other victims of the same seller, that helps investigative authorities handle the cases together. Even if the amount of damage is small, once the perpetrator is identified, recovery can be attempted through an application for a compensation order or small claims proceedings.
C. If you are the seller
When payment comes in, first check whether the sender's name and the amount match what was agreed. If the money came in under a name different from your trading partner, or the buyer is in a hurry, saying "someone else is sending it for me," confirm the reason before handing over the item. To avoid a later return claim by a voice phishing victim or a freeze on your account, it is wise to keep chat records showing that the deal was a normal sale at the time.
5. Closing
Secondhand trading is a deal in which strangers exchange goods and money on nothing but trust. As convenient as doorknob deals are, the schemes that abuse that trust keep changing. Yet fraud committed by pretending to sell goods, unlike voice phishing, is left out of swift remedies such as payment suspension, so recovery of losses tends to be slow. It is time for platforms to strengthen mechanisms that filter out conversations steering buyers toward prepayment, and for the system, too, to consider ways to quickly secure funds lost to secondhand trading fraud. Until then, the principle of "no payment before checking" is the surest defense.
(Shin Dong-woo, Managing Partner, DAEON Law Firm)
Photo: CC0photo, CC0 Public Domain (Flickr/Openverse)
2026. 10. 22. · By Attorney Dongwoo Shin
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