Bidders who tried to prevent the sale of Live 8 tickets on auction
website eBay have had their accounts suspended.
They placed bids of up to £10m for the tickets after Live 8 organiser
Bob Geldof asked people to place "impossible bids" to prevent the
sales.
The site later decided to withdraw the sales of the 2 July concert
tickets, which were won through a text contest.
But those who placed high bids in the meantime were e-mailed by eBay
to say they had been suspended from the site.
'Deliberate disruption'
Under eBay policy, it means they will not be able to use eBay in any
way, including registering a new account.
David Tilley, from Claverham, near Bristol, was one of the bidders
affected.
He placed a high bid and his account was frozen due to a "deliberate
attempt to disrupt an auction".
But at the same time he was sent an e-mail to say the tickets had
been withdrawn anyway as they breached acceptable items policy.
Mr Tilley told the BBC News website: "I want nothing to do with any
company who rips off a charity.
"The terms and conditions for the tickets quite clearly state that
they are not transferable."
n a statement, eBay said: "If an auction suffers hoax bidding, the
seller can report this to eBay customer support and the listing can
be removed. Sellers can then re-list the item for free.
"Sellers can also require payment as soon as the listing ends by
using our immediate payment service.
"Users who place hoax bids face two warnings from eBay and are then
indefinitely suspended on the third."
'Listening to customers'
A spokeswoman for eBay said the firm had no plans to make an
exception for the Live 8 bidders, despite agreeing to remove the
tickets from sale.
The auction site acted on Tuesday to remove the ticket listings after
"listening to customers".
But earlier in the day it had insisted the reselling of charity
concert tickets is not illegal under UK law, and would allow them to
be sold.
Geldof had launched an attack on the site and the sellers, calling it
"sick profiteering".
The Live 8 organiser called on the site to ban the tickets for next
month's London show - featuring acts like Coldplay and U2 - which
were won through a text competition.
eBay also came under pressure from the government, with music
minister James Purnell saying he "wholeheartedly" shared Geldof's
annoyance.
On Wednesday, Liberal Democrat culture spokesman Don Foster called on
eBay to introduce a UK charity auction site.
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