KEEPING IT FAIR.(NEWS)

Byline: Bob Gritzinger

As the used-car market heats up and an estimated 50 percent of those buyers head to the Internet to find their bargains on wheels, a new organization is hoping to help protect those shoppers from the potential hazards of online car buying.

While some sellers might merely stretch the truth about a car's condition, scammers have turned to fraud, such as odometer rollbacks, VIN cloning and retitling flood-damaged wrecksor worse. In a recent case in California, an online seller used a Craigslist ad to lure buyers to a meeting site, where they were robbed at gunpoint.

Enter FAIRFraud Abatement Through Industry Responsean informal group of used-car industry leaders including Autotrader, Carfax, Cars.com, eBay Motors, Edmunds and Pep Boys, which is in the early stages of developing a standardized set of services and tools to protect online car buyers. Mota Motors, a company that provides online tools to assist buyers and sellers in used-car transactions, is helping to coordinate the effort.

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