Plz help! Emails look like they're sent from me but NOT!

Moneygrabber

Hi can anyone help please?

My sister keeps getting emails which look like they are from me as it has my hotmail address as the sender! They are from shopping channels (some I have never heard of) stating I have just purchased an item (last one a Rolex watch, I wish!) and recommending the site to her.

Really fed up with this and don't know what to do

Thank you.

The_Grandmaster

Not sure where the problem lies but on both computers follow the instructions below (written by alienRIK):

Download MALWAREBYTES (Make sure you click 'DOWNLOAD LATEST VERSION')
http://www.filehippo.com/download_ma..._anti_malware/
Open malwarebytes and goto UPDATE and click 'check for updates'. After its updated goto SCANNER and click PERFORM FULL SCAN then click SCAN
Remove everything thats found (needs to be ticked)
Post the COMPLETE log here AFTER youve deleted everything it finds

reboot
Download HIJACK THIS (Make sure you click 'DOWNLOAD THIS VERSION')
http://www.filehippo.com/download_hijackthis/2894/
Click MAIN MENU then DO A SYSTEM SCAN AND SAVE A LOGFILE(Takes seconds) then post the log so we can see whats running
(do NOT do anything else with Hijack but scan and post the FULL log)

lesalanos

change your hotmail address. It has been hijacked and shouldn't cause anything more serious than what is happening now with false mails.

tronator

Moneygrabber wrote: »

Hi can anyone help please?

My sister keeps getting emails which look like they are from me as it has my hotmail address as the sender! They are from shopping channels (some I have never heard of) stating I have just purchased an item (last one a Rolex watch, I wish!) and recommending the site to her.

Really fed up with this and don't know what to do

It's quite likely that somebody who has your and your sisters email address in his address book got a virus and this virus is sending out SPAM messages with your address as sender. If this is the case, there's not much you can do about it. It's like somebody is writing letters and put your address at the back of the envelope as sender. Would you move houses if you get knowledge of it? I think not.

Of course, you should have an up-to-date antivirus installed and you should NOT use a user account with administrator rights for going online.
Furthermore you should use strong passwords (containing letters and numbers) which MUST NOT be the same for different accounts. And finally keeps Windows and all programs updated with the latest versions.

If you follow this basic advice you should be already well protected against most threats.

tronator

lesalanos wrote: »

change your hotmail address. It has been hijacked and shouldn't cause anything more serious than what is happening now with false mails.

What a st*p*d advice without knowing the cause of the problem. Would you move houses if somebody else sends out letters with your address as the sender on it?

If the account is really hijacked, then it should be enough to change the password. If it's not clear whether his/her computer is infected it should be done from a clean PC.

The next question would be to find out how this could happen. If the password is strong and is not a simple word, which appears in every dictionary, then the PC should be checked for viruses and trojans.

Moneygrabber

Hi all, many thanks. I've just changed password, will see if that works.

Won't be moving house lol.

Thanks

The_Grandmaster

If it's a spyware, it may remember the new password so better to be safe and run a malwarebytes scan.

tronator

Moneygrabber wrote: »

Thanks

You missed the button

---

v;)

dave2

The hotmail account doesn't have to have been hijacked at all. There is no security in email, anyone can pretend an email was sent from anyone.

On the other hand you do have a link suggesting the spammer somehow knows your sister knows you. Most likely someone has been compromised to some extent, but this could be *anyone* who has both your email addresses.

Of course you should change your email password anyway and check for viruses, but most likely the culprit is those damn people who send those annoying "every time this email gets forwarded Bill Gates gives 1p to charity" emails. These just hoover up email addresses for spammers because when you forward an email by default it also forwards the email addresses of everyone it was sent to before you.

Winky,_The_House_Elf

This happened to me.

Good advice above (Scan and change password), That solved it.

One nice side effect was people I hadn't been in touch with for years replying to see how I am, but DONT use the reply button to respond, send a new seperate email or it sends a last cascade of spam with it!

Hope that helps

The_Grandmaster

dave2 wrote: »

but most likely the culprit is those damn people who send those annoying "every time this email gets forwarded Bill Gates gives 1p to charity" emails. These just hoover up email addresses for spammers because when you forward an email by default it also forwards the email addresses of everyone it was sent to before you.

How do the original spammers then know who the e-mail got sent to?