With such high demand, figuring out where to buy a PS5 isn’t easy. But that’s made worse by scalpers that are still a serious problem as fans try to pick up Sony’s new console without paying too high a price.
Scalpers quickly applied technology to their work, using bots to buy up as many PS5 stock as possible and then resell the consoles for wildly inflated prices on sites like eBay. As the holidays approach, these annoying shopping bots have been renamed Grinch bots.
The use of bots to buy up stocks is nothing new, and they have been used several times in the past to help scalpers buy high-demand products like concert tickets and limited edition sneakers.
More recently, however, their usage has increased with the release of the PS5 and Xbox Series X. Both consoles are some of the hottest products of 2020, and scalpers felt an opportunity to make money.
It’s now gotten to the point where real consumers have used bots to buy themselves a console, even if they don’t intend to buy up additional shares and sell them for a profit. The Washington Post reported that retailers are well aware of this new trend, and it has become a constant war between them and the scalpers to ensure consoles are sold to legitimate customers and not resellers.
During the Black Friday sale, Walmart claimed to have blocked 20 million bot attempts within 30 minutes of the PS5 being back in stock. And Target said it is constantly tracking and blocking bots trying to buy similar in-demand products. British retailer Very went so far as to cancel 1,000 pre-orders once they were placed by bots.
Using a bot isn’t as easy as turning on a piece of software and letting it do its thing. A scalper who spoke to The Washington Post said that to bypass the merchant’s defense, he should cover up his IP address with proxies and adjust his delivery address to keep the orders from looking too suspicious. But Jerry Geisler, Walmart’s chief information security officer, said retailers are using the tricks of scalpers and their bots.
Geisler said that because bots are constantly evolving, so are the retailer’s bot detection tools. It’s a weird game of cat-and-mouse, but instead of cheese, the mouse goes on a PS5 or Xbox Series X. Unfortunately, it’s not always enough, and scalping bots come through the defense to buy up consoles.
But Geisler insisted that most of Walmart’s consoles were bought by real people, and in cases where they were bought by scalpers, steps were taken to cancel bot orders. Geisler, however, had no numbers to back up that claim.
While scalpers can run the launch of the new game consoles, we’ve got some helpful tips to make sure you have a shot at getting a PS5 or Xbox Series X before the holidays.