TRADING RULES
1. If it looks like the deal is too good to be true, it probably is. In real-life, would you buy a stereo easily worth $600 for the low low price of $50 out of the back of some guy's van? Of course not- that's just common sense. Apply that same sense to trading. If someone is "quick-selling" promos/unusuals/keys for well below their market value and needs to sell them fast, it may be because the account is hijacked or it is someone unloading stolen items.

2. Don't buy backpacks. When a person gets hijacked, what does the hijacker usually do? If you said move all or most of the items out of the person's backpack into another, you would be correct! So when you buy backpacks, especially for Paypal, you are putting yourself at risk two-fold:
a) You look like a hijacker
b) You become a magnet for a hijacker looking to unload stolen goods quickly.

3. Do not do Paypal trades with unverified Paypal accounts. This is trading 101. Hijackers will often use unverified Paypal accounts. Chargeback scammers often use them as well. So that's two good reasons to not do Paypal trades with them.

4. Avoid "quick-sells". Ask yourself why a person is trying to sell an item for much lower than its current value as quickly as possible. Consider the motivations of why the person is quick-selling these items.

5. Check the number of scammers on a person's friends list and when those scammers were added as friends. If you see the person has 4 marked scammers as friends and they were all added in the last day or two, this is a pretty good hint that the account may be compromised.

6. Check the user's comments on trade sites. Sometimes when a user is hijacked and they lose access to their account, they may create a trade that may gain a lot of people's attention (like selling an unusual for a scrap) and make the notes say something such as "THIS ACCOUNT IS HIJACKED DO NOT TRADE!" (An example can be found here). A lot of people don't see this, and it sometimes leads to them unknowingly buying stolen goods. While it won't happen all of the time, there isn't any harm in checking the person's recent trades.

7. When in doubt, ask... or just don't do the trade. If you even have the slightest inkling that an account might be hijacked, ask a community admin. We are here to help! We may not be able to tell you definitively, but we have seem enough of these cases that we usually have a pretty good idea of the signs of a compromised account. Also, if you have a gut feeling that there is something amiss about the trade, there may be very well be. NEVER do a trade if you get a bad feeling about it!