Outlook Express: Fake Email (Am I Being Hacked?)

  • Thread starter Thread starter pbell19
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pbell19

Good morning. I received an email with the following subject "557" and
the following body "5556." That was it. The other odd thing about it
was that my Outlook Express email address was listed as both the "from"
and "to," even though I never sent such an email.

Is someone trying to hack my computer? Or is this just some weird bug
and Outlook Express is just emailing itself for some reason?

Any assistance you could provide would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Paul
 
Hi Bell:

I cannot think of any circumstance under which Outlook would email itself.
dont' open the email again. but take a CLOSE look at the "to" and "from"
lines... are they EXACTLY the same? Those who seek to spread malware might
try to "spoof" the "from" address by adding or changing a character in the
addy in an inconspicuous way.

good luck

Mark
 
Just as an FYI, I got this exact same email in my gmail account. The
only difference was my subject line was 586876.

If anyone has insight on this I'd be curious to know as well. I did
look close and yes, the email did come from my gmail.
 
pbell19 <[email protected]>, le mar. 06 juin 2006
15:33:30, écrivait ceci:

Hi,
Good morning. I received an email with the following subject
"557" and the following body "5556." That was it. The other odd
thing about it was that my Outlook Express email address was
listed as both the "from" and "to," even though I never sent such
an email.
Click to expand...

My son has received the same. I suppose it's a probe mail to scan valid
email address. You will probably be spammed soon. Nothing to do
unfortunately.
 
Just as an FYI, I got this exact same email in my gmail account. The
only difference was my subject line was 586876.

If anyone has insight on this I'd be curious to know as well. I did
look close and yes, the email did come from my gmail.
Click to expand...

if you look REALLY close, then you'll see a DNS that's not gmail........
 
Gilles said:
pbell19 <[email protected]>, le mar. 06 juin 2006
15:33:30, écrivait ceci:

Hi,


My son has received the same. I suppose it's a probe mail to scan
valid email address. You will probably be spammed soon. Nothing to do
unfortunately.
Click to expand...


I got one of these this morning too. I just deleted it. Nobody will find out
that my address is valid that way, because I have read receipts turned off
here.
 
pbell19 said:
Good morning. I received an email with the following subject "557" and
the following body "5556." That was it. The other odd thing about it
was that my Outlook Express email address was listed as both the "from"
and "to," even though I never sent such an email.

Is someone trying to hack my computer? Or is this just some weird bug
and Outlook Express is just emailing itself for some reason?

Any assistance you could provide would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Paul
Click to expand...

http://isc.sans.org/diary.php?storyid=1384

A new twist in spammer tactics is being reported, although we're not sure
what their goal is at the moment.

Some of our readers report receiving messages apearing to originate from
themselves, with only numbers as subject and body.

The body does apears to be HTML encoded, but it's so basic as to not pose a
threat so far.

(jocko)
 
How do you do that in Outlook Express? When you select it to delete it you
are opening it.
 
Steve said:
How do you do that in Outlook Express? When you select it to delete
it you are opening it.
Click to expand...

You have to turn off the reading pane and auto preview.
"Callmark1" wrote:
Click to expand...

No. The lesson is never to open unexpected *attachments* and to read all
your email in plain text.

If no one opened unexpected email, then it isn't likely that any email
would get opened. If I have to call someone to tell them to I'm sending
email, I may as well deliver my message while I'm on the phone.

rl
--
Rhonda Lea Kirk

Insisting on perfect safety is for people
without the balls to live in the real world.
Mary Shafer Iliff
 
How do you do that in Outlook Express? When you select it to delete it you
are opening it.
Click to expand...
One click on the message lets y'all read the message in the preview
pane. Two clicks opens it in a seperate window while 2clicks on a
paper clip opens the attachment.
hth
 
I was lead to believe (a while back now) some spammers were creating emails,
with individually created .gifs for example (or jpgs, or whatever) and that
number reference your email (like a little picture of red cross in a box, so
you think the picture wasn't there), so when the .gif was read, which was
linked to a webserver full of these pictures (only small, so wouldn't take
up a lot of space (probably just short of a gig for like 20,000 email
addresses), then all they had to do was use a bit of software to read the
webserver logfile (for pages read, pictures accessed, files downloaded) and
just see which pictures were opened, which meant your email address was
valid as you'd see the piccy, and bam, the real spam then starts up.

Was this true, or was it a vivid dream, and I should seek medical help now?

Regards.
 
"Ken Blake, MVP" <[email protected]>, le mar. 06 juin
2006 18:07:22, écrivait ceci:

Hi,
I got one of these this morning too. I just deleted it. Nobody
will find out that my address is valid that way, because I have
read receipts turned off here.
Click to expand...

Spammers needs only to collect mail addresses without bounces from smtp
servers. You haven't the control. During a time I have used an
automatic bounce to spam in my local smtp server. It is not really
useful because lot of spammers don't check the answer.
 
le mar. 06 juin said:
The lesson again and again: never never never open email which
you are not expecting.
Click to expand...

What can it change. Your smtp server has already accept the mail. Your
mailer just take it throw the pop (or imap) server
 
I didn't see the original thread start, but two things you
need to do in OE:
1- Turn OFF the preview pane (actually more of
a "pain" ..) Views -> Layout uncheck the
preview pane. That sucker is dangerous !! I
leave it on on mine for news, but OFF for email.
2 - (just tumbled to this one the other day -- new
spammer routine).
Under Tools -> Options -> Receipts
set it to either "notify me for each" or to
"never send a receipt". I have found the new
(well, I had not seen it before) game is spam
that when you delete it says the sender wants
to be notified when his/her message has been
deleted (so they know you exist).

mikey
 
Same thing ,don't understand though how it got to get into my sent
folder as well as my inbox. If its spoofing my address it shouldn't
have appeared as a 'sent' message
as well. Confused I am ,new one on me
 
Same thing ,don't understand though how it got to get into my sent
folder as well as my inbox. If its spoofing my address it shouldn't
have appeared as a 'sent' message
as well. Confused I am ,new one on me
Click to expand...

The oddest coincidence in the one I received is that it was a working
telephone number in the area code from which it came. (The IP address
originated in Herndon, VA, and the number was in Burke, VA, about 18
miles away.)

If you look at your "sent" mail again, you will notice that the little
green label says "Inbox." You don't really have two copies; it's just
the same email appearing in both locations because gmail interprets it
as having been sent by you.

rl
--
Rhonda Lea Kirk

Insisting on perfect safety is for people
without the balls to live in the real world.
Mary Shafer Iliff
 
I was lead to believe (a while back now) some spammers were creating
emails, with individually created .gifs for example (or jpgs, or
whatever) and that number reference your email (like a little picture
of red cross in a box, so you think the picture wasn't there), so when
the .gif was read, which was linked to a webserver full of these
pictures (only small, so wouldn't take up a lot of space (probably
just short of a gig for like 20,000 email addresses), then all they
had to do was use a bit of software to read the webserver logfile (for
pages read, pictures accessed, files downloaded) and just see which
pictures were opened, which meant your email address was valid as
you'd see the piccy, and bam, the real spam then starts up.

Was this true, or was it a vivid dream, and I should seek medical help
now?

Regards.
Click to expand...

(Chiming in REALLY late on this thread...)

What you say is true, whether or not this practice still goes on is
another question.

I use Eudora which offers these 2 options....
-Automatically Download HTML graphics
-Allow executables in HTML content

With both turned off, I can't see graphics that are linked to a webpage
somewhere but I can see embedded graphics. Chances are that if the e-mail
contains either of those, it is not from someone I know and is not worht
my time to read it.
 
(Chiming in REALLY late on this thread...)

What you say is true, whether or not this practice still goes on is
another question.

I use Eudora which offers these 2 options....
-Automatically Download HTML graphics
-Allow executables in HTML content

With both turned off, I can't see graphics that are linked to a webpage
somewhere but I can see embedded graphics. Chances are that if the e-mail
contains either of those, it is not from someone I know and is not worht
my time to read it.
Click to expand...

I believe it was another one of those great "innovations" from MickeyMouse,
the idea of HTML formatted email messages. What silliness. What a way to
get others to see just what you are looking at. What an easy way to send
out some malware. Again, another MickeyMouse dumb idea.

Thankfully my email reader displays ALL HTML formatted messages as harmless
text messages. That's the only way I'd ever read email.


--
WGA is the best thing that has happened for Linux in a while.

The ULTIMATE Windoze Fanboy:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2370205018226686613

Is this a modern day equivalent of a Nazi youth rally?:

http://www.ntk.net/media/developers.mpg

A 3D Linux Desktop (video) ...


View Some Common Linux Desktops ...
http://shots.osdir.com/
 
..
I believe it was another one of those great "innovations" from
MickeyMouse,
the idea of HTML formatted email messages. What silliness. What a way to
get others to see just what you are looking at. What an easy way to send
out some malware. Again, another MickeyMouse dumb idea.

Thankfully my email reader displays ALL HTML formatted messages as
harmless
text messages. That's the only way I'd ever read email.


--
WGA is the best thing that has happened for Linux in a while.

The ULTIMATE Windoze Fanboy:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2370205018226686613

Is this a modern day equivalent of a Nazi youth rally?:

http://www.ntk.net/media/developers.mpg

A 3D Linux Desktop (video) ...


View Some Common Linux Desktops ...
http://shots.osdir.com/
Click to expand...

NoStop
Someday you will use a OS that is in the current century.
 
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