Suspicious Emails
be wary of unsolicited site password & login attachments
Wednesday, May 4, 2005 by starkers | Discussion: WinCustomize Talk
Just went to check my emails and found several suspicious ones in my junk mail, supposedly from big name sites to inform me of login and password information. I became immediately suspicious when one containing an attachment about my "so-called" yahoo personal information changes had been addressed to another person and then forwarded to me. As far as I know, Yahoo and Hotmail, etc, do not operate in this manner. Whilst I do have Yahoo and Hotmail accounts, I have none at AOL, Google, Hidaho or Bancoagrico, whatever that is. Each of these sent me emails regarding password and login information I would not have with them, and each had an attachment rather than displaying the information in the main body of the email. Furthermore, each sent additional mail to notify of email delivery failures, etc, and as I have sent no emails in recent weeks to anyone, this is rather suspect. In all, I had 11 of these, and others with similar sender names with only the title "re:" and no subject at all. With the Sober email virus prevelant again, one would have to regard such emails as suspicious and delete them immediately, as I did. The attachments could be laced with anything, so please everyone, be cautious
_02
Reply #2 Wednesday, May 4, 2005 12:33 PM
Reply #2 Wednesday, May 4, 2005 12:33 PM
Great advice. It cannot be told enough. There are still so many out there that are falling for that stuff everyday. Good thread!
starkers
Reply #3 Wednesday, May 4, 2005 12:35 PM
Reply #3 Wednesday, May 4, 2005 12:35 PM
Update: That was in my hotmail account and I've just found similar in yahoo as well, which I rarely use, if ever for email. I have to question: why would the mailmaster at yahoo send email failure notices to my hotmail account and visa versa. I have not sent a yahoo email in over a year, so yeah, be very careful and contact your own account holders personally if you've questions regarding your account details, etc.
Essencay
Reply #4 Wednesday, May 4, 2005 12:40 PM
Reply #4 Wednesday, May 4, 2005 12:40 PM
Yeah I just got about a dozen of these too. My ISP scans for viruses before it hits my PC. Easy catch...just annoying
starkers
Reply #5 Thursday, May 5, 2005 12:14 AM
Reply #5 Thursday, May 5, 2005 12:14 AM
Update: another day, another bombardment of dodgy emails! Is anyone else experiencing this: emails "supposedly" from reputable sites, and others with no previous connections sending supposed personal information in attachments? And therein lies the catch: an anti virus prog will detect nothing untowards until it's too late, when the attachment is opened. So far I've had in excess of 60 of these things in just 2 days and my paranoia levels are beginning to go through the roof, like I've a target painted on my email addy 
Thank goodness for junk mail filters
Thank goodness for junk mail filters
Essencay
Reply #6 Thursday, May 5, 2005 1:53 AM
Reply #6 Thursday, May 5, 2005 1:53 AM
http://skinartistry.com/news.php?extend.234 Hy_Rolr posted this in Skinartistry's news
WebGizmos
Reply #7 Thursday, May 5, 2005 4:57 AM
Reply #7 Thursday, May 5, 2005 4:57 AM
My Norton AntiVirus just caught one of those "W32.Sober.O@mm!.enc" viruses in an email this morning. 
Gee thanks sister-in-law! 
Gee thanks sister-in-law! 
Sleeping Dragon
Reply #9 Thursday, May 5, 2005 8:53 PM
Reply #9 Thursday, May 5, 2005 8:53 PM
It doesn't bother me so much that I receive them. It bothers me that there are people in the world that make a conscious decision to send them.
starkers
Reply #10 Thursday, May 5, 2005 9:01 PM
Reply #10 Thursday, May 5, 2005 9:01 PM
you're lucky so far - to date i have received over 200 of these suspect emails in my junk folder, each is exactly 37kb and prompting the recipient to open it with either too good to refuse offers or notification of a major prize win, or personal information details that in reality does not exist. the problem is that some appear to be quite legitimate at first look, but i have noticed that certain sender names keep reappearing in totally unrelated subjects: ie, [email protected] is also [email protected], and others, offering a variety of goods and services which one would normally not expect at one source.
Spam at its worst
Spam at its worst
Sleeping Dragon
Reply #11 Thursday, May 5, 2005 9:03 PM
Reply #11 Thursday, May 5, 2005 9:03 PM
I received one from Koasati, once. Not really, but they tried to tell me it was from Koasati. 
WebGizmos
Reply #12 Thursday, May 5, 2005 9:39 PM
Reply #12 Thursday, May 5, 2005 9:39 PM
First...if you didn't enter a contest how can you be a winner of anything? Second...delete ALL junk mail no matter how enticing it may sound. This doesn't mean you won't get a virus...I got 2 in my emails from my sister-in-law the other day...but it will cut down your chances of getting a ton of them.
One thing most people don't do is get themselves a disposable email address to use for signing up for things on the net. If you do that rather than using your own address you can just delete it when you realize it got sold out to some spammer.
If you have a website with your email address posted...that is one sure way to end up getting junk in your email box. One thing you can do to stop that is goto siteup.com Link and use the mailto encoder to get a encrypted email address code (listed under other resources) sent to you to use on your site...bots won't see this.
I've had my PC close to 2 years now and I get very little spam in my email, and I've had a website for about 5 years (on WebTv) with my email address listed there and I get nothing from it except what I want sent to me.
Most spam can be avoided...if you get tons of it in your email then your not protecting it enough.
One thing most people don't do is get themselves a disposable email address to use for signing up for things on the net. If you do that rather than using your own address you can just delete it when you realize it got sold out to some spammer.
If you have a website with your email address posted...that is one sure way to end up getting junk in your email box. One thing you can do to stop that is goto siteup.com Link and use the mailto encoder to get a encrypted email address code (listed under other resources) sent to you to use on your site...bots won't see this.
I've had my PC close to 2 years now and I get very little spam in my email, and I've had a website for about 5 years (on WebTv) with my email address listed there and I get nothing from it except what I want sent to me.
Most spam can be avoided...if you get tons of it in your email then your not protecting it enough.
starkers
Reply #13 Friday, May 6, 2005 10:24 AM
Reply #13 Friday, May 6, 2005 10:24 AM
Most spam can be avoided...if you get tons of it in your email then your not protecting it enough.
Up until recently I only ever received solitited mail from friends and family in my hotmail account inbox, with very little, if anything going to the junk folder. The reason being: I never enter comptitions or respond to "too good to refuse offers" on the net. However, since recently registering new software/hardware, etc, the spam has been coming thick and fast, despite deselecting the options to receive adverising materials and ' too good to refuse offers" on the net. I see more than enough of that on tv and in my letterbox, so I certainly don't want it on my computer. Obviously my email address has been accessed from elsewhere or sold to spammers. Fortunately, from word go, I set my inbox to receive only mail from known contacts or trusted sites such as Wincustomize, but still check the junk folder to ensure mail from new contacts is not lost through not yet been added to the safe list. Normally speaking, I delete all but the new contact mail, but was almost duped into opening something that appeared to be official and legitimate. Had I not been alert at the time, I could have inadvertantly opened it due to its "so-say" authentic appearance. That's the purpose of this thread, to alert the unwary of the threat. If people believe they have taken the necessary precautions and safe-guards they will mistakenly believe they are safe from such attacks and make my "almost" mistake.
OK, so I'm community minded, despite knowing no-one here personally.
Furthermore, when speaking with a friend earlier, he said that he received an email from his sister with an attachment, yet she emphatically says that she attached nothing to the email she sent. If this is so, the plot thickens dramatically, so much so, I am directing my contacts to refrain from using web based emails and to use my ISP address instead, where I never ever receive unsolicited. mail
CYA's people
Up until recently I only ever received solitited mail from friends and family in my hotmail account inbox, with very little, if anything going to the junk folder. The reason being: I never enter comptitions or respond to "too good to refuse offers" on the net. However, since recently registering new software/hardware, etc, the spam has been coming thick and fast, despite deselecting the options to receive adverising materials and ' too good to refuse offers" on the net. I see more than enough of that on tv and in my letterbox, so I certainly don't want it on my computer. Obviously my email address has been accessed from elsewhere or sold to spammers. Fortunately, from word go, I set my inbox to receive only mail from known contacts or trusted sites such as Wincustomize, but still check the junk folder to ensure mail from new contacts is not lost through not yet been added to the safe list. Normally speaking, I delete all but the new contact mail, but was almost duped into opening something that appeared to be official and legitimate. Had I not been alert at the time, I could have inadvertantly opened it due to its "so-say" authentic appearance. That's the purpose of this thread, to alert the unwary of the threat. If people believe they have taken the necessary precautions and safe-guards they will mistakenly believe they are safe from such attacks and make my "almost" mistake.
OK, so I'm community minded, despite knowing no-one here personally.
Furthermore, when speaking with a friend earlier, he said that he received an email from his sister with an attachment, yet she emphatically says that she attached nothing to the email she sent. If this is so, the plot thickens dramatically, so much so, I am directing my contacts to refrain from using web based emails and to use my ISP address instead, where I never ever receive unsolicited. mail
CYA's people
dot.lizard
Reply #14 Friday, May 6, 2005 11:18 AM
Reply #14 Friday, May 6, 2005 11:18 AM
on a semi-related note: i had an email addy that was completely spam-free for over a year, because i was very careful about giving it out. i did business with an online merchant, was very happy with their service, and wanted to give them a good review -- on BizRate.com. i read their privacy policy, and was very careful to select the options that would opt me out of receiving spam, even the convoluted ones they use to try & befuddle you ("uncheck the checked box if you do not wish to be excluded from not receiving email" and things of that nature), but within days i was *innundated* with spam, and soon after, with fraudulent "phishing" scam-mails. they all buy the same lists i guess. i sent off a furious email to BizRate pointing out that they had violated their stated privacy policy and ruined an email address that i'd been very careful with; i may have also wished them boils -- big ones, in sensitive places -- i tend to do that with spammers.
they responded saying that "of course i can opt out" and even had the nerve to blather on about how they "valued my privacy" (lies. lies.) but by that point, it made no difference -- once you've opened pandora's inbox, it's all over. you can't unsell a sold-out email address.
it's a shame, really, i do believe in using feedback / community rating systems for online merchants, and it would be nice if the largest site providing a centralized way of doing this wasn't a scum-sucking batch of spammers, but it is.
they responded saying that "of course i can opt out" and even had the nerve to blather on about how they "valued my privacy" (lies. lies.) but by that point, it made no difference -- once you've opened pandora's inbox, it's all over. you can't unsell a sold-out email address.
it's a shame, really, i do believe in using feedback / community rating systems for online merchants, and it would be nice if the largest site providing a centralized way of doing this wasn't a scum-sucking batch of spammers, but it is.
starkers
Reply #15 Saturday, May 7, 2005 7:09 AM
Reply #15 Saturday, May 7, 2005 7:09 AM
My business wasn't with an online merchant but a reputable department store, and my only online activity as to register my product to access driver upgrades and software update, etc. As always, I opted out of all promotional offers, and still got product information from elsewhere. It makes you wonder if online registration is worth it, hey!
Traversing the www can be like playing hopscotch in a minefield
Traversing the www can be like playing hopscotch in a minefield
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Reply #1 Wednesday, May 4, 2005 12:32 PM