My emails/computer has been hacked into

saving123

hi all,

really looking for some help asap if anyway can assist - basically last night when i tried to get into my emails i couldnt and eventually after saying i had forgotten the password and gone through secruity etc i got in - when i got into my emails i immediately noticed an email from paypal saying i had paid someone a significant amount of money. I checked my paypal account and the money was showing as coming out. I have been speaking to paypal who are investigating this but i am concerned as to how someone got my password in the first place. I have read people can hack into your computer and see you typing in passwords etc. I am looking for advice as to what to do as i am now scared to use my computer. Also i have two computers - one that is never used - will it be safe to use this one or if they hack into one will it affect both (i know this probably is a stupid question but thinking if both computers use same internet connection / isp address does this mean they will be able to hack into both)??

thanks so much for any help

RussJK

Did you log into Paypal via a link in the email you received? Or did you manually go to paypal via the web browser? This is very important to know.

How do you normally access emails, i.e. email client like Outlook/Windows Mail, or through a web interface? Is it an ISP email address, or something like Hotmail or Gmail?

Start with some basics.

Do a QUICK scan (not full scan) with Malwarebytes Anti-Malware, clean everything it finds and post the log here.
http://www.users.on.net/~russ/mb.exe

Do a scan with HitmanPro, then and remove anything more interesting than cookies.
http://www.users.on.net/~russ/hm.exe

Post a Hijackthis log, all the guidance needed to do it is here:
http://www.users.on.net/~russ/hjt

RussJK

You should change all your passwords (particularly paypal) from the other computer, although I'd make sure it has an up to date antivirus as well as the latest Windows Updates. Also I'd run Malwarebytes Anti-Malware and HitmanPro on both.

If your main computer is infected, then anything you do on it could be suspect - so no point changing passwords from it until you know one way or another.

edit: I see that you've reported it to Paypal already:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3484881

saving123

thanks for responding. I went to the paypal website myself. I know they send out fake emails that you should never click on so definately wouldn't do that. It is hotmail i use. At the moment i am running anti virus software on both computers (Kaspersky Internet Security 2011) - on the one that is never used it is finished and has found nothing - on the other one it is still doing the scan but so far found nothing. I have started to change passwords on various accounts using the computer that i never normally use. Would you risk using this one for paypal at the moment? Just now i am just really worried incase i do anything that someone can hack in to. I am removing card details from anything i use on the internet - amazon, tesco etc and have already cancelled my cards anyway. Is there anything else i should be doing? Do you think it would be safer to close down the email accounts i currently have and set up a new one? thanks again for your help

macman

Change your Hotmail password for something stronger. i.e. not 'fred'.

saving123

i had it as a word with numbers, capital letters etc so no idea how someone has got access to it!

birkee

saving123 wrote: »

i had it as a word with numbers, capital letters etc so no idea how someone has got access to it!

It was a scam email probably.
Somebody has got your email address.
The quickest way to give this away, is to circulate emails, particularly emails sent to you by somebody else.
Had one recently from a Niece, warning about a fake attacker. This had been sent initially via a NHS computer, and contained the email addesses of all the cancer patients, and the staff at Redditch Hospital. Not only that, it had also been sent via a Social Services computer, and gave the email addresses of all their staff too. Maybe clients too, for all I know.

I would trust Kasperski Internet every time, and I've used it for years with no problems, but there's no way on earth I would trust Hotmail with emails.

DO NOT circulate emails, Copy and paste the text into a new email without all the addresses on, and to send for multiple receipients, send 'blind carbon copies' so none of them can see the email addresses of the other people you've sent it to.

RussJK

Quite possibly it was just the hotmail account hacked. Was the password for hotmail different to paypal? and were both passwords strong? Do you use the same password for different sites?

You can use this site to tell password strength:
http://rumkin.com/tools/password/passchk.php

On the suspected computer, do the steps I've already listed (Malwarebytes, Hitmanpro, Hijackthis).

jpman19

Ensure you change all your passwords from a different computer. Also, it may be worth having a few hidden files in various places on your PC where you can copy and paste your passwords from each type, instead of typing them.

RussJK

jpman19 wrote: »

Also, it may be worth having a few hidden files in various places on your PC where you can copy and paste your passwords from each type, instead of typing them.

Won't make a difference for keyloggers. You'd be better spending your energies making sure the system isn't infected in the first place.

jpman19

This is true. It's not going to do any good for infected systems. However there's no harm in being extra careful with these things.