scam alert: fake psa cards from ebay seller "cardregistry"

[Tennis13]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

They already have an overwhelming market share. Where is the growth going to come from?

Without giving away a very easy business model secret, currently you send in a card -- whether it is 1990, 2000 or 2016 -- and they almost never touch it again.

Meanwhile, the end consumer is buying and trading authenticated slabs with sonic sealing and holograms. Sort of like running your PC on Windows 95, no? Or do people even use PCs anymore? Amazing how services/products can become obsolete so fast.....I do wonder if there is a business opportunity there.....(It's HUGE given the brand....and it would allow them to perhaps undo some prior wrongs).

[Peter_Spaeth]

Perhaps, although they have already hit up the "installed base" to use an analogy for half grades, and I suspect quite a number of folks have sent in cards for the newest generation of holder even if it isn't much of an improvement in terms of security. Not sure how many times you can go back to that well.

[Tennis13]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

I suspect quite a number of folks have sent in cards for the newest generation of holder even if it isn't much of an improvement in terms of security.

Start by making it a "revolutionary improvement", use diamond, casino, jewelry and other industries with high fraud problems as a template, and invest $1 mln or $3 mln there, as opposed to burning that money on some online swap meet....but i digress......I do think the lack of security evolution is a big problem, but also a very reliable, recurring revenue generator for this business.

The hologram and sonic seal, based on this example, seems like it's not reliable anymore. And if I want to ensure my $1000 baseball card is legit, I am willing to pay a small premium for the revolutionary grading going forward. And if I need to sell one with the old holder, well, I sure do hope the hologram and the sonic seal are good enough.....or else......cha ching.

[begsu1013]

can see a tad of frosting in that top right hand corner of the mantle, so it maaaaay be a little bit securer, i guess.

it's certainly a lil more noticeable than what was on the one i purchased.

does anyone here know anything about the sonic welding process?

curious if you can re-weld a previous welded spot?

is the cloudy spot/corner from the case being cracked or is that simply some adhesive that has clouded up.

they used to just use krazy glue and it was extremely easy to spot...

if it's the adhesive, then they've gotten much better at concealing that part of it....

edit: imagining a mental picture of all these guys down in mehico setting up test runs w. all sorts of glue imported from all over the place

[steve B]

Originally Posted by begsu1013

can see a tad of frosting in that top right hand corner of the mantle, so it maaaaay be a little bit securer, i guess.

it's certainly a lil more noticeable than what was on the one i purchased.

does anyone here know anything about the sonic welding process?

curious if you can re-weld a previous welded spot?

is the cloudy spot/corner from the case being cracked or is that simply some adhesive that has clouded up.

they used to just use krazy glue and it was extremely easy to spot...

if it's the adhesive, then they've gotten much better at concealing that part of it....

edit: imagining a mental picture of all these guys down in mehico setting up test runs w. all sorts of glue imported from all over the place

Here's some info.
Slabs are most likely polycarbonate (Lexan)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultrasonic_welding

Rewelding in a different fashion or even the same might be possible, but would be a bit of a challenge.

Assuming a take of 150K a month or better, there are very few technological hurdles you could put in the way that would be all that hard to defeat.
Even the treasury believes that counterfeit notes are available very soon after the release of the new designs.

Steve B

[mrcardfan]

Just read the entire thread all I can say OMG. I have some graded cards in the new PSA holders and I don't see how they can be tampered with . The older holders you can pop them open and reseal easy like that 67 mantle . But that 52 mantle 8 not sure those can be opened or resealed or tampered with.

[sportscardtheory]

This stuff is scary. Makes me want to stop buying any PSA cards and stick with "buy the card not the grade" only in BGS holders, which seem damn near fake-proof and tamper-proof. Seems like FAR less risk.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by sportscardtheory

This stuff is scary. Makes me want to stop buying any PSA cards and stick with "buy the card not the grade" only in BGS holders, which seem damn near fake-proof and tamper-proof. Seems like FAR less risk.

If you think they can spot altered cards as well as PSA and SGC, go for it.

[Beastmode]

Originally Posted by mrcardfan

Just read the entire thread all I can say OMG. I have some graded cards in the new PSA holders and I don't see how they can be tampered with . The older holders you can pop them open and reseal easy like that 67 mantle . But that 52 mantle 8 not sure those can be opened or resealed or tampered with.

Seems to me there are differing scenarios of fraud here.

1.) cracking a PSA case, inserting a lesser grade card, then resealing the case; still same cert #, same authentic PSA label, same authentic PSA hologram
1.A). same thing above, but inserting a counterfeit card

2.) manufacturing a molded plastic case (the same as PSA's); grabbing the cert number from an existing high grade card, counterfeiting the PSA label, and inserting a lower grade card
2.A) same thing but inserting a counterfeit card

So yes, buying the card, not the holder resolves most of 1 and 2, but doesn't resolve 1A and 2A. Which gets back to my question I had earlier. Is PSA addressing the card when Bob sends back the resealed holders?

If this is an organized criminal enterprise, I would suspect it's a lot more efficient to manufacture a PSA case and copy flips, then to crack hundreds/thousands of cards and reseal. With the amount of time involved, I would assume the dollar value of these cards has be north of $1K.