How to remove a fraudulent strore on shopify

[sherrie215]

Where do I find the Shopify Take Down Request Form for a fraudulent store on shopify?

I have a  shopify account/business with a shopify balance debit card. My card recently hacked/charged by a store on shopify for almost $1K. 

After some research it turns out the store is fraudulently using another company's name and product images and is a fraud. The real company doesn't sell online at all. This owner of the fraudulent store has a LONG history of fraud and may have several shopify stores. They have had business licenses suspended and several lawsuits for fraud before.

I was told I needed to have the police file out a Take Down Request Form but I am unable to find it to download it.

Reported to Shopify already but the store is still there and it hasn't been an easy process to get this resolved...at all.

Any help would be appreciated. Thank you

[Laza_Binaery]

Hi @sherrie215 

Have you tried already this link?  https://www.shopify.com/legal/tools/report-an-issue/report-a-merchant

If you did well try something else: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fIUiv9-UFk

Check the video and all the links where you can try to report fraud.

Good luck.

[sherrie215]

yes, I have I filed that. I was looking for the form for police to file which I have since found. This has been 2 days of running in circles, I've been shuffled from 5 different shopify support people on chat, to stripe, to visa, to Celtic bank, back to stripe and back to shopify. No answers about my funds and the fraudulent store is still on shopify. 

[Laza_Binaery]

My bad, for police report search online your local city police website. There should be some online form where you could report credit card fraud, here is an example at https://slcpd.com/resources/online-report/

And all that jumping from one service to another and no one to give help must be tiresome. Can you share a link to that fraud store?

[sherrie215]

it is. Its been 2 days of run around and nobody cares at. today is day 3. I have 4 open tickets and not an answer to any. 

Fraudulent store is here

AQUADYNE SYSTEMS (aquadyne-systems.myshopify.com) 

[sherrie215]

I have confirmed this store is fraud, I was in contact with the REAL owner of Aquadyne. They do not sell to the public because they are a government contractor.  The products and images on this shopify store are stolen. I was able to get help from GODADDY and uncovered the fraudsters name, address and many legal records for previous fraud. All have been reported to shopify 3 days ago. Fraudulent store is still there and I have no answers about getting my $ back

[Laza_Binaery]

I am afraid that Shopify can not help you get your money back. Only your bank but seems that is tricky and requires a lot of hustle.

You did a good investigation and got data from Godaddy that should help. I reported the store to Shopify, but I'm not sure if it makes any difference. I have noticed that the address on the privacy-policy page is residential so it is most likely fake.

Wish you luck getting this sorted.

[sherrie215]

The money was from my shopify balance card issued through my shopify store.  Yes, I've had to file a chargeback but it took 3 days to figure out WHO I needed to actually deal with after being shuffled through shopify, visa, stripe and celtic and back and forth.

In addition Im asking for the fraudlent store to be REMOVED from shopify. It doesnt help when you cant actually SPEAK with a live person and then have to wait for responses to tickets. 

[sherrie215]

That address is residential and in Arizona, these people have had multiple lawsuits and have had business licenses revoked by the state of ARIZONA. They have ran several scam businesses. Also, the email on that policy page is the REAL Aquadyne company in Georgia. But the email received from them on the order invoice says sales@aquadynefilters.com but its a mask and the real email is <store+64686424111@t.shopifyemail.com 

[Merchanto · Accepted solution]

To find the Shopify Take Down Request Form for reporting a fraudulent store, you can visit Shopify's Help Center and search for "Report a Store." This section provides guidance on how to report fraudulent activity, including links to the necessary forms. If you have a police report, make sure to include that information when you submit the form to expedite the process. Keep following up with Shopify support for updates on your request.

[sherrie215]

The form you are recommending is the one I/myself have already submitted.

The form I needed was the Take Down Request Form for Government Regulators. It was hard to find but the form has been located and given to police to submit.

[sherrie215]

5 days and the fraudulent store is still operating on Shopify. I am at the point that I don't think Shopify cares at all about fraud on its platform. I have submitted all of the forms and made every complaint within my power, and my local PD has filed the proper forms as well with shopify. They don't respond back to my ticket for days at a time. I keep following up. There is so much information about this fraudster, it should have taken no less than a couple of hours to determine that it's a fraudulent store.

I moved my store to Shopify and been here for a couple of years now, but this definitely changes how I feel about moving forward with my store hosting here.

[scam_stop]

Hi, 
This is a very nice response / theory. 
I found at least 4 fake storefronts: 
https://shop.app/m/104vfycnqt
https://shop.app/m/0rumne92dg
https://shop.app/m/vzcn6qt3ya
https://shop.app/m/manq5ecy21
which are phishing sites designed for harvesting credit cards. (look at the fake support emails in the Returns section)

I followed these instructions and got a hilarious email back from Shopify telling me how proud they are of their over 1 Million shops and not to worry about and just to write to the stores if I have any questions. 

[scam_stop]

Hello, 
I have noticed that the steps to report fraudulent stores do not work very well. (Does anyone know why Shopify does not react?)
Therefore this post is a place to report fraudulent stores which are presumably used for phishing credit card details. The goal is to have them taken down and save people the misery of being scammed. 

Reporting these stores to Shopify does not always work. I was advised by Shopify to go ahead and order and then get in touch with them if there were any issues (?)

You can tell that these stores are fake because of any number of factors: 
The email contact points in the Returns or Complaints sections are strange gmail emails. (see below)
There is no physical address or phone number. If there is and you look them up you will see they are fake. 
The prices are a fraction of market prices. 

Here are two I noticed last week and reported to Shopify and are still online: 
https://rockvinylstores.com/

https://vinylvinylfy.com/

I would love to be wrong about this - if I am please let me know. 

Documentation: here are the Refund Policy details from rockvinylstores: 
To start a return, you can contact us at simongrahamgriffiths@gmail.com. Please note that returns will need to be sent to the following address: [INSERT RETURN ADDRESS]