My email address was invaded

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chris Kam
  • Start date Start date
C

Chris Kam

I know my this problem may be an old one. But any ideas will be
appreciated. I'm using Toshiba P3500 with Outlook XP as my default email
client plus XP built-in firewall. This morning I've received a junk email
from a "hotte jones ([email protected])". The problem is that
(e-mail address removed) is my own email address. I immediately run antivirus
program and Spybot to check through my notebook (and no sign of my lovely
notebook being hacked) . Now I'm hesitate to click "Block" (coz sometimes I
have to send email to myself for technical testing purpose). Kindly advise.
 
If it's any comfort, it wasn't sent from your email, they just spoofed it to
avoid spam traps.
 
You need to read the full header (method varies w/the email program you use) to
see where it really came from ... but this is a common tactic with trojans.
They'll use any address on the infected computer as the sender address, not
necessarily that of the actual owner, as it deters the recipient letting the
owner know their computer is infected.

It is also a VERY common tactic of spammers, so it could just be an out-and-out
junkmail.

Still good to use your AV program, and of course avoid opening email attachments
& downloading unknown programs from the internet ... but it sounds like you're
safe & just being prudent.

-- DE
 
Hi Hotte Jones;

If you only have a few spammers, use your message
blocker. You can always remove the block whenever you
want to test and then wait to see if they're still
lurking. The blocked messages are dumped into the Deleted
Items folder, so it's easy to check their activities. I
did that and they did disappear after a few weeks. Then I
removed the block permanently. The blocked messages are
dumped into your Deleted Items folder, so it's easy to
check their activities. If you have a lot of spammers, I
find it's best to make a minor change to your user name
and notify all your friends. Use bcc a lot so nobody can
make a list of your friends from your messages.

It's sad that we are subjected to this deluge of spam.
It was noted in Consumer Reports recently, the most
recent issue, I think. It would be nice if some of these
clever hackers came over to our side one day and found a
way to catch them all.

Regards... Richard.
 
from the wonderful said:
I know my this problem may be an old one. But any ideas will be
appreciated. I'm using Toshiba P3500 with Outlook XP as my default email
client plus XP built-in firewall. This morning I've received a junk email
from a "hotte jones ([email protected])". The problem is that
(e-mail address removed) is my own email address. I immediately run antivirus
program and Spybot to check through my notebook (and no sign of my lovely
notebook being hacked) . Now I'm hesitate to click "Block" (coz sometimes I
have to send email to myself for technical testing purpose). Kindly advise.
Click to expand...

If you stick the complete header through spamcop (http://spamcop.net,
but you'll have to register), or dig into it with Sam Spade
(http://www.samspade.org/t/), you'll find that it was actually sent from
someplace else (probably in Taiwan, Korea, South America, etc.) with a
'spoofed' from address. Quite likely it came through an open relay on
someone's Trojan/Virus infected machine. Don't worry about it.
 
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