By Editor,Emma Saletta

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Walmart’s Marketplace boom comes with surge in scams, identity theft concerns

READ MORE: Walmart becomes poster child for shoplifting chaos

By EMMA SALETTA, US AUDIENCE REPORTER

Published: 13:59 BST, 28 September 2025 | Updated: 16:22 BST, 28 September 2025

Shoppers are falling into scammers’ traps on Walmart Marketplace — unknowingly buying counterfeit products from sellers posing as legitimate businesses.

Mary May, 59, thought she’d scored a deal when she spotted Neuriva brain supplements at a steep discount. She ordered eight bottles.

Instead, she received fakes with misspelled labels and suspicious packaging. The seller had joined the marketplace by using the name of a legitimate business.

‘Walmart betrayed me. They let me purchase something that could have harmed me, my family,’ May told CNBC.

‘As a customer, I expect them to care about my well-being when I purchase something from them. Whether it’s from a third-party seller or not, it’s on Walmart’s website.’

Walmart refunded the Tennessee resident, but her case was far from unique.

A CNBC investigation found at least 43 vendors had registered on Walmart Marketplace using stolen business names.

In testing, all 20 products bought from those sellers turned out to be counterfeit.

A woman became a scammer victim after purchasing counterfeit supplements on Walmart Marketplace

Walmart Marketplace is lenient on seller policies compared to some of its competitors

‘It’s very disturbing. It’s a domino effect, and it trickles and affects everyone,’ said Elaine Damo, owner of Lifeworks-ACS — the legitimate business whose name was copied by scammers. Her company provides services for individuals with developmental disabilities.

Nearly two decades after launching its marketplace, Walmart has loosened its guardrails.

Sellers now face fewer document requirements to sign up, and the platform allows products that Amazon — the nation’s biggest retailer — restrict

‘If you look at Walmart, they look more like a flea market than a trusted marketplace. It’s like the Wild West on their platform,’ said Bob Barchiesi, the president of the International Anti-Counterfeiting Coalition.

‘You can’t try to sell trust from aisle five and then let counterfeiters in online.’

As part of the investigation, CNBC tested the authenticity of 20 items from third-party sellers under the names of businesses. All products were proved to be conterfeit.

The study also includes reviews of hundreds of product listings and seller pages on Walmart Marketplace and 90 interviews — some being with shoppers that fell for scammers’ schemes.

‘I trust Walmart, I thought I was buying it from them. It’s there website,’ said Aurora Aguilar, a shopper who bought skin-care products from a seller impersonating a business.

Some of its current policies require less documents to sign up

Most designer makeup and skincare sold on Amazon and TikTok is FAKE, major investigation reveals

Lifeworks-ACS received over a dozen returns from May and other shoppers who purchased the counterfeits from the seller impersonating the company, Damo said.

Reckitt, the maker of Neuriva, has since launched its own probe.

The company urged anyone who suspects they’ve purchased fake products to stop using them and contact Reckitt directly.

Neuriva is just one of many brand-name items being sold by the surge of third-party sellers on Walmart’s marketplace — a surge that boosted the platform’s revenue 37 percent in 2025.

Walmart’s e-commerce division now generates around $100 billion a year and could account for 10 percent of all U.S. online sales by 2026.

Former Walmart vetting team member Tammie Jones claimed she was pressured to approve seller applications — including those that look suspicious.

‘It got to a point where they were just like, ‘You know what? Just go ahead and approve everybody,” Jones said of her managers’ orders.

‘They wanted that business, so they were willing to take a chance on it.’

Walmart’s e-commerce business makes around $100 billion annually

Walmart is second to Amazon in a ranking of the nation’s biggest retailers

‘We’re unwavering in our commitment to delivering everyday low prices, a broad assortment, and innovative shopping experiences. Counterfeiters are bad actors who target retail marketplaces across the world, and we are aggressive in our efforts to prevent and combat their deceptive behavior,’ Walmart told CNBC.

‘We enforce a zero-tolerance policy for prohibited or noncompliant products and continue to invest in new tools and technologies to help ensure only trusted, legitimate items reach our customers.’

While the changes have created chaos, Paul, a third-party seller, approves of them after noticing challenges in selling products on Amazon.

‘It’s more of a Wild West compared to Amazon. So it’s a breath of fresh air for somebody like me,’ he revealed.

Amazon insisted its third-party sellers were ‘thriving,’ with over 60 percent of sales being from independent sellers.

Outside of the marketplace, shoppers in Walmart stores have been victims of card skimming — a scam targeting customers’ credit card information.

The company has implemented gadgets at keypads like ‘belts’ and a red tape covering card readers.

Besides tools, stores have opted to remove all self-checkouts — including a store in Missouri — axing them after logging in 509 police calls last year.

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Walmart’s Marketplace boom comes with surge in scams, identity theft concerns

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