Some of it on ebay is probably NOT an intentional scam.
Just some hopeful newbs buying a machine that they don't really know how to handle, then messing it up and running to the protective cover of ebay (apart from the obvious OP case).
NOT as described-sure, after they burn it down by using LIVE connector (see Phil's posts about this problem) to controller after misinterpreting bitmain's ESL instructions (much better than my chinese, admittedly).
Yeah but in all the cases above the buyer didn't even ship the units back! I got screwed in this way on ebay years ago. I had an account with over 200 feedback, all positive, and had it since the site started back in the late 1990s.
Once ebay over tripled their fees they went downhill quick. You used to be able to ban people with under any number of feedback from bidding on your auctions which I always did on high value items $1,000+, at least over 10-20 feedback I remember for sure. Not anymore. You also used to be able to send negative feedback for buyers, which kept them in check. Not anymore. The buyers started to send me negative feedback for the stupidest things after that, basically ruining my perfect account. I had to kiss ass and give kick backs just to get the damn feedbacks removed, much like the feedback scammers on Yelp. They really get you by the balls and it sucks.
The final straw for me was when I got a charge back for a very large ticket item, and never even got the item shipped back to me. They went and took the money straight out of my bank account one day. It overdrafted me and made it so that my bills, rent, and everything that month were screwed up because I sold the item to free up the cash for bills and rent and the end of a hard month.
I hate ebay now when I used to love it and stand by it. I used to make almost all of my purchases and sales on it religiously. Not anymore. I'll use it for a few things if I have to but only as a last resort. I mostly only buy now as I can't take the risks associated with selling on that shit site. They really ruined a good thing.