CYBERFRAUD: Amazon’s Third-Party Sellers Hit By Hackers.

Hackers are targeting the growing population of third-party sellers on Amazon.com Inc., AMZN 1.35% using stolen credentials to post fake deals and steal cash.

In recent weeks, attackers have changed the bank-deposit information on Amazon accounts of active sellers to steal tens of thousands of dollars from each, according to several sellers and advisers. Attackers also have hacked into the Amazon accounts of sellers who haven’t used them recently to post nonexistent merchandise for sale at steep discounts in an attempt to pocket the cash, those people say.

The fraud stems largely from email and password credentials stolen from previously hacked accounts and then sold on what’s dubbed the “dark web,” a network of anonymous internet servers where hackers communicate and trade illicit information. Such hacks previously have favored sites such as PayPal Inc. and eBay Inc., but Amazon recently has become a target of choice, according to cybersecurity experts.

“Hacking Amazon is becoming…increasingly a big deal,” said Juozas Kaziukėnas, chief executive of Marketplace Pulse, a business-intelligence firm focused on e-commerce. “The value to be gained is bigger as Amazon grows.”

It isn’t just hackers racking up fraudulent sales on third-party accounts — there are also fraudulent third-party sellers.

I got hit by one last week, in which an item I purchased was delivered to Waterbury, CT. The seller didn’t respond to my request for a refund or a new delivery, so Amazon refunded my money. But as it turned out, the seller been doing this to their customers for a full year — taking the money and, apparently, delivering the merchandize to themselves.

Amazon dealt with the year-old situation only after the fact, and even then it required a 15-minute phone call on my part. That’s because Amazon’s website doesn’t offer customers the options necessary to report fraudulent sellers and issue a refund. Wider reporting options for legitimate customers would go a long way to help Amazon detect fraudulent sellers more quickly.

The company has a serious problem on its hands, but it isn’t clear that they’re taking it seriously enough.