I recently purchased a PAM88 from Ebay that looked and sounded completely legit. Here are a few things that look and sound odd to me. The warranty card is not stamped / imprinted with an AD name like the two other Panerai I own. It is only printed in bla...
...to go get the cardboard box back from the trash! So yeah, I guess throwing away of the box is more the norm than exception. But any Richemont service center should be able to authenticate your Panerai for a small fee.