Weird Hotmail hack?

[minke]

Anyone else come across this? I recieved an email from the wife whilst she was out, it contained junk containing various links to dodgy looking url's and mentioned china a lot. It was sent from her to one of her friends only,but turned up in my email box. When she got into her hotmail account there were loads of notifications of failed emails. Virus scans all come up negative and her passwords are supposedly really secure. They have all been changed now but I haven't come across this one before. Anyone seen anything like it?

[AAJagerX]

Yeah, I've had one or two of these pop up in the last month or so.  Virus scans all good here too.  I think Hotmail may have an issue.

[Masherbrum]

I don't use Hotmail or Outlook. 

[1701E]

It happened to Yahoo as well, had a um..."enhancement" ad get sent from my mother's E-mail to everyone in her address book.

[trax1]

They could simple be using programs that try to access your accounts trying thousands of passwords until it hits on one, that way you would have a virus thats giving your info away.

Edit: should be wouldn't, not would.

[Masherbrum]

I've never seen this happen yet.   I cannot help but thank ESET Smart Security 4.

[Denholm]

Step 1, don't use email clients. Step 2, stay away from Microsoft/Windows email accounts (Yahoo is now owned by Microsoft).

[cpxxx]

Yes it happened to me a while ago. Everyone in my yahoo address book got an email linking to a Chinese electrical goods mail order company. So I sent on a follow telling everyone to ignore it. On the positive side. I got back in touch with a couple of people who I had stopped corresponding with.

[batch]

this is an old trick thats been around for many years............ they arent stealing your password and you dont have a virus.........

they are forging headers............ they gather real email names from various places............ then they send out mass spam with a forged header (thats the beginning string of info in an email that says where its coming from)............ when email responders reject mail they dont dig through the header info to find the real source...... they simply take the addy that the header gives them as good........... this is why when the email "bounces" it comes back to your inbox......... and  you think hey I never sent that mail

next time you see one of those just open the header info........ you can clearly see in there where the email truely originated


think of it as if we were talking about real mail (that stuff the old people used to communicate)  ...... if I sent a letter to somebody but I put your name and address on the envelope.......... if the email was return to sender it would come to your house............ forged headers are the same thing

[Fulmar]

this is an old trick thats been around for many years............ they arent stealing your password and you dont have a virus.........

they are forging headers............ they gather real email names from various places............ then they send out mass spam with a forged header (thats the beginning string of info in an email that says where its coming from)............ when email responders reject mail they dont dig through the header info to find the real source...... they simply take the addy that the header gives them as good........... this is why when the email "bounces" it comes back to your inbox......... and  you think hey I never sent that mail

next time you see one of those just open the header info........ you can clearly see in there where the email truely originated


think of it as if we were talking about real mail (that stuff the old people used to communicate)  ...... if I sent a letter to somebody but I put your name and address on the envelope.......... if the email was return to sender it would come to your house............ forged headers are the same thing

+1

I get about 3-4 emails a day from myself.  They just 'spoof' the headers.

[trax1]

If they were just spoofing the headers then what are the odds that they would have sent the emails to ever person on there address list?

[Skulls22]

Is gmail safe from this?

[batch]

If they were just spoofing the headers then what are the odds that they would have sent the emails to ever person on there address list?

the odds would be pretty close to about 1:1............. these spam companies have every email address there is........ they buy lists from companies that do nothing but harvest email addresses.......... and guess what they also buy lists from ISPs..... your provider like most others has probably sold this list before........

then they forge the headers and send them to everyone........... so while it seems odd that every person on their email list got it....... they werent the only ones who got it.......... they just happen to know the person who "it came from"

like fulmar said...... although not as often as I used to......... at least once a week I get spam that appears to come from my own addy

[Fulmar]

the odds would be pretty close to about 1:1............. these spam companies have every email address there is........ they buy lists from companies that do nothing but harvest email addresses.......... and guess what they also buy lists from ISPs..... your provider like most others has probably sold this list before........

then they forge the headers and send them to everyone........... so while it seems odd that every person on their email list got it....... they werent the only ones who got it.......... they just happen to know the person who "it came from"

like fulmar said...... although not as often as I used to......... at least once a week I get spam that appears to come from my own addy

The main address I use is from my personal website, but I have it forward to a gmail account.  But spam bots have gotten a hold of the 1/2 dozen other people who have email accounts through my website.  So I'll get a spam email from friends of mine.

But it is possible for viruses to get into your address book and go nuts.