BajaNomad

WARNING about Email Hackers

Pompano - 2-21-2013 at 11:35 AM

Hi Nomads, my post here is in the way of a warning about possible hackers to your Email Account. It happened to me just the other day.

The following is an email I recently received.


The Bad Email:

"pendingThursday, February 21, 2013 10:42 AM
from: Yahoo!


Dear Customer,
Your E-mail account has exceeded its limit and needs to be verified, if not verified within 24 hours, we shall suspend your account.

For immediate access, Please click on the link to verify Your Account : CLICK HERE

Thank you
Customer Care"


As I unknowingly and foolishly clicked on Click Here, all my email contacts were stolen and disappeared.

I found out thru some amigos that the hacker/s then sent scam emails to all my contacts and plied them for money to help in a bogus armed robbery in the Philippines. Total nonsense....(I once had a severe hangover in Subic Bay, but was never mugged).

I realize this is an old story to many, but if any of my Nomad amigos received such an email, please disregard and accept my apologies. I immediately hired a computer virus/hacker specialist and he has 'cleansed' my pc and tutored me on any future hacker events. It was a tedious procedure. I hope you can avoid my mistake and costly correction.


Please be forewarned... it can be redone to read any mail account...hotmail, gmail, etc.


Thanks to Nomad DianeT and others for bringing this to my attention. And another thanks to Diane for mentioning the hacking in one of her posts here.

So, that's my tale of woe. I would much rather be relaxing in Baja!

Moral to this story is...Be very careful what emails you open on your computer!

bajajudy - 2-21-2013 at 11:39 AM

There are some going around that say nothing in the re or something like Hi or Hello or Hey
Then there will be a link. DO NOT open this link. If you are not sure, email the sender and ask if they sent it.
If you do open it, change your password immediately
Pomp...I assume that you have already changed your password.

BTW I have that same friend in the Phillipines trying to get in touch with me...noooooooooooooo

Pompano - 2-21-2013 at 11:41 AM

Hi Judy,

Yes, a warning bell went off and I immediately changed my password. Too late to save my email contacts, but forestalled any further hijack. You live, you learn.

DavidE - 2-21-2013 at 12:08 PM

Ah yes....the Po City aftermath (Near Death Experience)

WARNING: You have exceeded the overdraft limit on your _______ bank account. In order to avoid overdraft penalties, please verify by sending your VISA, MasterCard, Discover, and American Express card numbers, expiration date, and security code number on the reverse of the card. This will verify that you are indeed you and no one else. Confidentiality is assured in our Lagos, Nigeria security headquarters.

I would love to have the money to hire the folks who thoroughly screwed the Iranians. Return a worm that is the equal of an electronic "Alien".

David K - 2-21-2013 at 12:15 PM

It happens...

Sweetwater - 2-21-2013 at 12:16 PM

I don't use FB very often but find family photos and events there. My sister seemed to have sent me a link to a Starbucks coupon which didn't seem like such a big deal.

Yup, clicking that link hacked my account and flooded each of my friends with the same link. Changed my password immediately and complained to FB. They did delete the links but gave no information on how this happened.

The email account has been flooded with spam, easily screened but the phone number also garnered a weeks worth of spam. Fortunately it's a land line with caller ID so after no response, those calls stopped.

Life in the digital age goes on.

Hook - 2-21-2013 at 04:06 PM

I swear that 99.9% of the time that a friend's email account gets hacked, it is a Yahoo account.

I have a Yahoo account, too, and it's been compromised twice.

BajaBlanca - 2-21-2013 at 05:33 PM

I once opened the email and immediately realized my friend had not sent it and changed the password ..... no one's email contact was stolen but it could have happened. do people not have something better to do withn their lives ?????


:mad:

monoloco - 2-21-2013 at 05:38 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Hook
I swear that 99.9% of the time that a friend's email account gets hacked, it is a Yahoo account.

I have a Yahoo account, too, and it's been compromised twice.
I've noticed that too, my Yahoo account got hacked and all my contacts received ads for some weight loss product.

DianaT - 2-21-2013 at 06:56 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by bajajudy
....If you are not sure, email the sender and ask if they sent it....


Right after I sent the money to the Phillipines........ ;)

Seriously, if you receive one of these e-mails that says your friend has taken a trip somewhere and they were mugged, DO NOT email the sender. Find another way to contact your friend.

The first one of these I received was from a friend in Punta Chivato. It did not sound like her at all, but I wondered. I did not hit the reply button as I was suspicious. I did a separate e-mail to her at her e-mail and received a reply that said, it really was her and she needed the help right away. The hacker had total control of outgoing and incoming e-mail.

I next e-mailed another friend in Chivato and found out what was happening. And then I found out that replying MIGHT cause my e-mail problems so I changed all my passwords everywhere!

:fire::fire:

deportes - 2-21-2013 at 06:58 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by monoloco
Quote:
Originally posted by Hook
I swear that 99.9% of the time that a friend's email account gets hacked, it is a Yahoo account.

I have a Yahoo account, too, and it's been compromised twice.
I've noticed that too, my Yahoo account got hacked and all my contacts received ads for some weight loss product.


Same happened to me with Yahoo!

MikeYounghusband - 2-21-2013 at 07:07 PM

Thanks for the warning, new to me.

durrelllrobert - 2-21-2013 at 07:20 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by BajaBlanca
I once opened the email and immediately realized my friend had not sent it and changed the password ..... no one's email contact was stolen but it could have happened. do people not have something better to do withn their lives ?????


:mad:

Yea, what does a hacker get out of this?
Some kind of personal pleasure?
Certainly no Money.

Phising

msawin - 2-21-2013 at 10:09 PM

Yes it happens a lot..

Phising is the term. I had it happen to me 3 years ago just before we headed to Baja....two days actually.. I made mistakes.... This is important.....

Do not go to your bank accounts and change pass words...

Do not go to any E-mail accounts you have and change pass words...

Open a new E-mail account. New Name.. #1.. FIRST
go to Gmail.com or SBCGLOBAL.net

Go to your $ accounts,
you can still get into them and change your info, contact info. Change your E-mail account to the new E-mail account,
#2, Second...

than change your NEW pass word at your Bank .... #3,
the bank will send you a e-mail with this pass word change to your NEW E-mail Address. not the old Phising one.

All bank accounts e-mail the [ Phising acct] that you changed your the pass word. That is than directed to the High Jacked E-mail account you can no longer access with this information...

Password Checker, try it out.. http://howsecureismypassword.net/

Kgryfon - 2-21-2013 at 10:47 PM

This happened to me once, only I was (unknowingly) sending out Viagra ads. One of my male friends got offended and finally emailed me asking if I was trying to be a smart-ass! Ha ha! I had no idea I had been hacked!

ncampion - 2-22-2013 at 09:55 AM

I think that just about everyone has been hacked at one time or another, sometimes you may not even know it. I know all the "do's and don'ts" but still got hacked just last week (as some of you may know). I just wish that hackers could put that considerable talent to good use instead of creating frustration for all of us.

Marinero - 2-24-2013 at 05:52 PM

In my Comcast email account I can right click on the email (does not open it) an get a list of choices, one of which is "View Source". This comes up independently and lets you sort of read it without opening it. Also lets you see return paths, etc. Great for spotting spam and worse. Does anyone have any real info as to how safe this utility is? I have never had a problem using it, but........
Do other email servers have similar screens?