You wake up, grab a coffee, and check your business email. There is a weird notification from a customer you’ve never heard of, complaining about a bottle of face serum that smells like vinegar. You don't even sell face serum. You sell industrial drill bits.
This is the nightmare of walmart third-party seller identity theft. It’s messy, it’s growing, and honestly, it’s way more common than the big-box giant wants to admit. While everyone has been focused on Amazon’s "Wild West" marketplace for years, scammers have realized that Walmart’s rapid expansion created some serious cracks in the floorboards.
The "Shadow Seller" Problem
Basically, bad actors aren't just making up fake names anymore. That’s amateur hour. Instead, they are stealing the legitimate credentials of existing businesses—everything from tax IDs to physical addresses—to set up shop on Walmart.com.
Why? Because a verified business name with a real history gets through the "vetting" process faster.
In late 2025, investigations revealed dozens of stores operating under the identities of companies that had no idea they were "selling" on Walmart. We're talking about everyone from local pizza shops in Chicago to massive scientific equipment firms. The scammers use these stolen identities to list thousands of items, usually at a massive discount, to lure in unsuspecting shoppers.
Once the orders roll in, the "shadow seller" either sends a cheap counterfeit or nothing at all. But when the customer gets mad? They don't find the scammer. They find you. They find your real business phone number or your office address and start demanding their money back.
How These Thieves Actually Pull It Off
It’s surprisingly low-tech sometimes. Scammers hunt for "zombie" companies or businesses with active registrations but no presence on the Walmart Marketplace.
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They scrape public records for:
- Employer Identification Numbers (EINs)
- Business utility bills (sometimes forged)
- Real physical addresses
Once they have the data, they apply to be a seller. For a while, Walmart was so hungry to catch up to Amazon that they allegedly loosened the reins. Former employees have shared stories about being pressured to approve accounts quickly—sometimes hitting a "green light" on 40,000 new sellers in just a few months. When the "approve, approve, approve" directive is in play, a stolen EIN starts to look a lot like a legitimate application.
Then comes the "test buy" trap. A scammer might list a popular supplement—like Neuriva—under a stolen business name. A shopper sees it 40% cheaper than anywhere else and hits buy. What arrives is a bottle with typos on the label and god-knows-what inside. The shopper complains, Walmart looks at the account, and suddenly your legitimate business name is associated with selling dangerous fakes.
The July 2025 Pivot
To be fair, things changed a bit last summer. After some pretty embarrassing public exposure regarding counterfeit health and beauty products, Walmart tightened the screws. They introduced a much more aggressive vetting process specifically for those "high-risk" categories.
Now, if you want to sell skincare or supplements, you often have to show more than just a tax ID. You need to prove where you’re getting the stuff. Invoices, letters of authorization—the works. But here is the thing: that only protects those specific categories. If you're a victim of walmart third-party seller identity theft in the home goods, electronics, or hardware niches, the gate is still much easier to jump.
Your Brand is Being Hijacked (What to Do)
If you find out someone is using your name, you have to move fast. Don't wait for Walmart's automated systems to catch it. They won't.
First, go straight to the Walmart/Sam’s Club Identity Theft Victim’s Affidavit. It’s a formal portal where you can upload your actual documents to prove the other person is the fraud. You’ll also want to file a report with the FTC. It sounds like a lot of paperwork, but you need that paper trail when the "shadow seller" starts racking up thousands of dollars in fraudulent sales under your tax ID.
Actionable Steps for Real Protection
- Sign up for the Walmart Brand Portal. This is non-negotiable. It’s their version of Amazon’s Brand Registry. It gives you way more power to report intellectual property (IP) violations.
- Set up Google Alerts for your business name. If your company name starts popping up on "deal" sites or in Walmart search results for products you don't carry, that’s your first red flag.
- Audit your business credit. Scammers often need to "verify" financial status. If you see weird inquiries on your business credit report, someone might be trying to open a seller account or a merchant processing line in your name.
- Conduct "Ghost" Searches. Once a month, search for your company name on Walmart.com. You’d be surprised how many businesses find themselves "selling" items they’ve never touched.
Honestly, the burden is on the business owner right now. Walmart is using more AI to monitor listings, sure, but those systems are mostly looking for "banned" words or copyright images. They aren't necessarily checking if the guy in Florida using a Montana construction company's EIN is actually who he says he is.
If you're already seeing weird returns arriving at your warehouse—packages you didn't send—stop everything. That is the "domino effect" of identity theft. Those returns are the smoking gun. Save the shipping labels, take photos of the fake products, and get your legal counsel involved immediately to issue a Cease and Desist to the "seller" (even if it’s a ghost) while simultaneously hammering Walmart’s Trust and Safety team.
The goal isn't just to stop the sales; it's to protect your EIN from being flagged by the IRS for "unreported income" that the scammer actually pocketed.
Take the time this week to search for your own brand on the marketplace. It takes two minutes and could save you six months of legal headaches. If you find a "shadow" version of yourself, use the Walmart Brand Portal to file an IP infringement claim immediately. Just proving you own the trademark is often the fastest way to get a fraudulent account nuked.