Hello everyone, I know that many people have already mentioned similar topics, but I still want to confirm and hope to get a reply as soon as possible. I am an international student in the United States, so please forgive me for the grammar mistakes. I bought an extra game cassette of The Animal Crossing by mistake, so I want to sell the extra one. I put it on ebay, offered it for less than the original price, and within minutes a buyer came to me and offered the original price. He said that he wanted to buy a surprise gift for his stepson, so he hoped that I could buy a $300 gift card to send together with the game card. He would pay the money together with the game card, and he would also like to pay me $50 for the freight. To pay, he asked for my paypal account email. At first, I thought it was a little strange that he would pay full price for what I had marked down, but I didn't give it a second thought. But when he asked me to buy an extra $300 gift card, I sensed something was wrong. There was no need for me to buy a gift card, he could have bought it himself. I was wary but unstated, and then he said he had transferred the money to me. I got an email purporting to be from paypal in seconds, it said that money had been held and I could not receive the money until I replied to the photo of the gift card for confirmation. I found it odd because some of the sentences in the letter did not sound like official emails, such as "This method of payment can not be reversed, so you have absolutely nothing to worry about." But if I have to reply the photo of the gift card, I already paid $300 for the gift card! The buyer was very "kind" and told me where I could get the gift card he needed, so I thanked him and said I would send it tomorrow. Then I checked the email again, still feeling wrong, so I opened my paypal app. I didn't find the money in a recent activity, and my experience tells me that even if the money was actually held, I should have seen a transfer that was "pending". At this point, I feel very likely that this is a scam, I hope someone can help me to confirm whether this is true or not. What am I going to do next, just ignore him? Do I need to report it to someone? At the same time, I also want to know how much my privacy will be damaged. He already has my mobile phone number and paypal email, will there be any follow-up problems?
