Well I've heard all the talk about how bad Alibaba is, so I decided to do a little experiment to see if it was true.

I set up a new email address, and contacted a whole bunch of Gold Suppliers (you know - the supposedly reliable ones)

Of the 30 or so Gold Suppliers I contacted, every single one of the emails I have recieved with prices worth following up so far has turned out to be a scam. Some of them involved incredibly well put together phishing websites and fake escrow services. I really couldn't believe how real some of them looked.

The wierd thing is, when I contacted the companies on Alibaba directly they had no knowledge of the scammers. What I'm really curious about is how these people got my email address. How did they know the content of my messages to the Suppliers? Do the scammers work at the companies involved? Are they intercepting mail somehow? I'd love to know.

So far I have spent many, many hours researching sellers and the only good wholesale deals I have found have been from American companies. It depresses me because I know there are much cheaper Chinese sellers out there, who are probably honest. I wish there was a way of finding them.