HELP! Seems I've been violated .... Not nice
Discussion
Tried to sign on to the internet tonight and my ISP won't accept my password. After a quick call to the help desk (sexy Irish accent, sounded loverly) anyhow, it would appear some low life sent out a load of SPAM using my account details.
Q1 - How?
Q2 - Why can't I see all these SPAMS in my 'mail sent' box?
Q3 - What can I do to stop it happening again?
Q4 - Why do they do it?
Q5 - Is the ISP doing enough to prevent this stuff?
I'm not stupid, I never open email from address' I do not recognise. I have never given my account details out to anyone. I'm confused.
Any advice (IN ENGLISH WOULD BE A GREAT HELP) on stopping this and how to get the ISP to do more!
Paul
Q1 - How?
Q2 - Why can't I see all these SPAMS in my 'mail sent' box?
Q3 - What can I do to stop it happening again?
Q4 - Why do they do it?
Q5 - Is the ISP doing enough to prevent this stuff?
I'm not stupid, I never open email from address' I do not recognise. I have never given my account details out to anyone. I'm confused.
Any advice (IN ENGLISH WOULD BE A GREAT HELP) on stopping this and how to get the ISP to do more!
Paul
First, get yourself a firewall if you don't have one already. www.zonelabs.com has a free one that sits in the background and stops hackers. It has detected nearly 3000 intrusions since I installed it 2 months ago.
Next, you might want to sweep you computer for viruses and spyware. Can't recall sites for this, but I'm sure someone else will be able to.
Next, you might want to sweep you computer for viruses and spyware. Can't recall sites for this, but I'm sure someone else will be able to.
Q1 - How?
Dunno, I'm sure someone will help in a mo...
Q2 - Why can't I see all these SPAMS in my 'mail sent' box?
Ditto
Q3 - What can I do to stop it happening again?
Install a firewall, I use Sygate, but lots of people use zone alarm or tiny, search for 'firewall' on this forum
Q4 - Why do they do it?
money
Q5 - Is the ISP doing enough to prevent this stuff?
Obviously not
I'm sure someone who doesn't have the wisdom of Miss Stella will provide some real help shortly.
Dunno, I'm sure someone will help in a mo...
Q2 - Why can't I see all these SPAMS in my 'mail sent' box?
Ditto
Q3 - What can I do to stop it happening again?
Install a firewall, I use Sygate, but lots of people use zone alarm or tiny, search for 'firewall' on this forum
Q4 - Why do they do it?
money
Q5 - Is the ISP doing enough to prevent this stuff?
Obviously not
I'm sure someone who doesn't have the wisdom of Miss Stella will provide some real help shortly.
Anyone can send an email from anywhere, claiming to be anyone else (without your PC being involved in any way). If your ISPs investigations stopped at that point, they weren't being thorough enough. The headers of an email reveal the path it took, and if that reveals your PC as the source, then shutting the account wasn't such an un-reasonable step (but they SHOULD also have contacted you by some other means to explain the situation).
If you could persuade the ISP to send you some samples of the offending emails (including full headers), then a less-infrequent visitor than me to these fine pages will be able to give you advice on what is/isn't happening.
If you could persuade the ISP to send you some samples of the offending emails (including full headers), then a less-infrequent visitor than me to these fine pages will be able to give you advice on what is/isn't happening.
Following funkynige's good example - previous answer re-formatted to match the original question:-
Any number of ways, possibly not even involving your PC.
They may never have passed through your PC at all, and even if they did, the conversation between computers when sending an email is so simple that any dubious program could do the job itself.
Need to find out the source first. zonealarm's "don't let anything connect to the internet without asking me" feature may help identify any dubious program you may inadvertantly be running.
Because they are advertising genuine and useful services which may be of interest... no, thats not it.
Almost certainly not!
Get ZoneAlarm installed, and get some sample emails from your ISP including (v. important) the full original headers - will prove whether you're at fault in anyway, or a completely innocent victim.
Q1 - How?
Any number of ways, possibly not even involving your PC.
Q2 - Why can't I see all these SPAMS in my 'mail sent' box?
They may never have passed through your PC at all, and even if they did, the conversation between computers when sending an email is so simple that any dubious program could do the job itself.
Q3 - What can I do to stop it happening again?
Need to find out the source first. zonealarm's "don't let anything connect to the internet without asking me" feature may help identify any dubious program you may inadvertantly be running.
Q4 - Why do they do it?
Because they are advertising genuine and useful services which may be of interest... no, thats not it.
Q5 - Is the ISP doing enough to prevent this stuff?
Almost certainly not!
Get ZoneAlarm installed, and get some sample emails from your ISP including (v. important) the full original headers - will prove whether you're at fault in anyway, or a completely innocent victim.
ultimapaul, it's possible for anyone to send an email with literally any address as the 'from' address. You could fake your 'from' address by changing the settings in your email program. When you first created your email account in your email program, you'd have been asked for your email address. The program uses that as the 'from' address. You can change this any time yourself. If you're using Outlook, for example, you change this in the 'Accounts' settings.
So, it sounds to me as though someone has sent a bunch of emails with your email address as the 'from' address, and to do this they wouldn't need any personal details from you or your computer. Quite why they chose your email address is presumably a mystery, but installing a firewall will not stop them doing this (although a firewall certainly won't do you any harm).
Your ISP presumably deals with this kind of thing all the time from other users who really have sent out a bunch of spam using their own account, so they jumped to a hasty conclusion about your activities. However, it's a little unfair of them to accuse you without doing some basic checks on the emails that have been causing offence.
So, there isn't a lot you can do about this. It can happen to anyone, but fortunately doesn't happen often. Your ISP should forgive you.
Feel free to email me directly if you want more help.
-Ben
So, it sounds to me as though someone has sent a bunch of emails with your email address as the 'from' address, and to do this they wouldn't need any personal details from you or your computer. Quite why they chose your email address is presumably a mystery, but installing a firewall will not stop them doing this (although a firewall certainly won't do you any harm).
Your ISP presumably deals with this kind of thing all the time from other users who really have sent out a bunch of spam using their own account, so they jumped to a hasty conclusion about your activities. However, it's a little unfair of them to accuse you without doing some basic checks on the emails that have been causing offence.
So, there isn't a lot you can do about this. It can happen to anyone, but fortunately doesn't happen often. Your ISP should forgive you.
Feel free to email me directly if you want more help.
-Ben
You should also download a program called Spybot that detects "Trojan Horse" software that infiltrate your pc and sends data each time you are online.
Just run it after each session and it will detect and delete these pesky blighters!
You can get it at http://security.kolla.de/
Just run it after each session and it will detect and delete these pesky blighters!
You can get it at http://security.kolla.de/
Thanks a lot people, again PH proves more helpful than the professionals you PAY to do a job!
On a hopefully unrelated issue, I'm having some trouble on occasion accessing the PH forum pages. I can sign on OK and gain access to the main forum page by clicking ‘Gassing’ From there I have a problem where if I click on a forum, any forum it all just freezes. Not the PC just the web site.
I get ‘Opening Page blab la bla’ at the bottom left and the blue bar goes across the whole box ……… then nothing!
I’m running a 1.66ghz P4 with Xp. AOL as ISP and browser.
The only way out is to close the web page and start again. This problem does seem to be only with PH, but there again it is the only site of this type I use!
Cheers again
Paul
On a hopefully unrelated issue, I'm having some trouble on occasion accessing the PH forum pages. I can sign on OK and gain access to the main forum page by clicking ‘Gassing’ From there I have a problem where if I click on a forum, any forum it all just freezes. Not the PC just the web site.
I get ‘Opening Page blab la bla’ at the bottom left and the blue bar goes across the whole box ……… then nothing!
I’m running a 1.66ghz P4 with Xp. AOL as ISP and browser.
The only way out is to close the web page and start again. This problem does seem to be only with PH, but there again it is the only site of this type I use!
Cheers again
Paul
For the record I agree entirely with sublimatica on this matter..
I doubt that a firewall would have stopped this - it's highly likely that someone has just hijacked your email address rather than hacked into your account or your PC. In which case, the ISP have been slack in not picking up on this from the headers.
As has already been said, ZoneAlarm will let you know if anything is trying to access the internet from your PC which shouldn't be.
I doubt that a firewall would have stopped this - it's highly likely that someone has just hijacked your email address rather than hacked into your account or your PC. In which case, the ISP have been slack in not picking up on this from the headers.
As has already been said, ZoneAlarm will let you know if anything is trying to access the internet from your PC which shouldn't be.
julianhj said: First, get yourself a firewall if you don't have one already. www.zonelabs.com has a free one that sits in the background and stops hackers. It has detected nearly 3000 intrusions since I installed it 2 months ago.
Next, you might want to sweep you computer for viruses and spyware. Can't recall sites for this, but I'm sure someone else will be able to.
Cut out all the rubbish inbetween and just go straight there
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