Spam emails with names of people I know

[JHZR2]

I havent gotten one lately, but for a while I was getting them...

Spam messages that are claimed to be from someone I know.

Like say I know Joe Smith, whose email is [email protected]. I might get an email that says it is from Joe Smith, but with an email of [email protected], and a subject of "hello".

Inside of the message is a URL to a site that is who knows what. These arent really detailed or special emails, not spear phishing or anything fancy.

But somehow they know peoples' names that I do contact. Friends, family, etc.

I dont send data over wifi besides my own, which is secured. I dont go to questionable websites.

So any ideas? I find it hard to believe that so many others, my wife included, whose account I know is secure, are hacked themselves.

I have a good password that is secure for any account I use, and nobody has ever reported spam mail from me.

Any ideas???

Thanks!

 

[buster]

Good questions, I've been wondering the same thing. I've noticed this as well.

 

[daman]

I think its because the person you know his email got hacked,i had this happen not to long ago.And all his contacts(you)get sent spam,etc.

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted By: daman
I think its because the person you know his email got hacked,i had this happen not to long ago.And all his contacts(you)get sent spam,etc.


Ive gotten that before. This seems different to me... In those cases, it has all entirely been from the person, using their name and email address and everything.

These are weird because they use the name, but everything else is different...

Not sure though...

 

[DuckRyder]

It is possible someone hacked their e-mail account particularly if it is hotmail or yahoo or something like that. (tell them to change the password)

Also sometimes an infected computer will send e-mail to an entire address book but will set the "from" to a random address from the address book. So it is possible that the person who it is "from" is not the infected person.

 

[eljefino]

I get this as well. For a couple weeks my main computer (with POP) was down so I was using webmail and was still getting them. So I felt pretty good it wasn't me.

If a 3rd party was hacked they could have gotten your name and the name of your "sender" if you CC'd or were CC'd on something.

 

[Barkleymut]

I recently unsubscribed to a bunch of spam and somehow everyone I have ever sent an email to (not just contacts) was sent an email containing a link to a weight loss website. I immediately changed my email password, oh well.

 

[Rand]

its spoofing so that you cant figure out who is sending it and tell them hey u got virus.

 

[JHZR2]

I know my wife does not have a virus nor an insecure account. Ive gotten a few from her... Some with just her first name, some with her whole name. She only uses webmail, BTW.

And I find it hard to believe that 10 or so people I know have a virus.

Thats why it is so odd to me...

 

[DuckRyder]

It's not odd at all.

You're in someones address book along with you wife and the 10 people, person has a virus. It sends mail to the whole address book and randomly picks someone else in the address book to say it is "from". Odds are that other people will eventually get one "from" you if they have not already.

 

[Kiwi_ME]

This happened to me when in a moment of inattention I joined one of those sites that suggested that I log in using my email account. Within a short period of time my account had been entered and all my contacts received the spam email you mention, plus they used that same password (and those found in old emails) to hack into all sorts of other things including my home router, webcam and security DVR. The culprits must have a script to download stored emails quickly so they can be parsed later for info.

 

[daves87rs]

Originally Posted By: DuckRyder
It's not odd at all.

You're in someones address book along with you wife and the 10 people, person has a virus. It sends mail to the whole address book and randomly picks someone else in the address book to say it is "from". Odds are that other people will eventually get one "from" you if they have not already.





And I've heard it is very hard to avoid getting them. I've heard (but not yet confirmed) that you do not even have to open them, they just have to get to your inbox....

 

[Garak]

Originally Posted By: JHZR2
Like say I know Joe Smith, whose email is [email protected]. I might get an email that says it is from Joe Smith, but with an email of [email protected], and a subject of "hello".


Joe Smith is a common name. That's probably the cause.

Sorry, couldn't resist. Aside from that, did some mutual friend get their address book compromised? The only way I could conceive of this happening is if your address book got it, some mutual friend's did, or, at least hypothetically, something like a Facebook group of friends.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: daves87rs
Originally Posted By: DuckRyder
It's not odd at all.

You're in someones address book along with you wife and the 10 people, person has a virus. It sends mail to the whole address book and randomly picks someone else in the address book to say it is "from". Odds are that other people will eventually get one "from" you if they have not already.





And I've heard it is very hard to avoid getting them. I've heard (but not yet confirmed) that you do not even have to open them, they just have to get to your inbox....


No, you have to open them and usually click on a link of some sort unless it has embedded content.

 

[Kruse]

My wife got a bunch of them about a month ago. I'm pretty sure it was Facebook related as they were all of her Facebook friends but she didn't have their email addresses.

 

[JHZR2]

Interesting. Facebook could be a culprit, though we have restricted everything to friends only.

The log in to a website with an email address is an interesting comment, though they would need to be able to hack your account (assuming you idnt use the same password as your email), though I suppose they have all the time in the world.

Still, we use strong passwords so I doubt it. But that is scary.

 

[spackard]

My wife's work account did this a few months back, GMail account, no computers were turned on at the time, no FB. I could tell it was different because it spammed all her contacts, and its origin was from gmail servers (I used to hunt spammers so I am pretty good at reading email headers).

I had her tumble her password, and installed two-factor authentication for GMail. You install an app on a mobile phone, and enter its 6 digit number when you authenticate to GMail. I figure, now even if her password is guessed/cracked, the attacker won't get in now.

You can go another level up with LastPass and let it choose unique passwords for every site you have an account on. It's free to use on a PC, but you have to pay a small monthly fee to use it on Android. One of the known weaknesses now is people using one username/password for all their online accounts. This is probably an up-and-coming exploit, and was recommended as a thing to do by a security professional recently.

 

[Dave Sherman]

Just happened to me, but I'm not sure it was somebody I know. It may very well be my own e-mail that was hacked. I got a ton of bounced e-mails sent back to my Yahoo mail, and the addresses were all variations of addresses of people I know. Then some people started asking me about a link I supposedly sent, and when I looked at the distribution list, the addresses were so widely unrelated I don't think it was any one of them, but they were all addresses I've e-mailed before, some of them from years ago.

 

[DBMaster]

This happened to one my by best friends, my brother, and to me. The three of us do not share the same ISP. About three of these trash emails were sent from my Verizon account. Since I got bounces from a few outdated email addresses that were in my Verizon web mail address book I figured they had somehow hacked my account. I changed from a six character password to a more complex ten character password and the bogus emails stopped.

I am thinking that the actual Verizon server may have been hacked and not my account alone, but somehow I doubt Verizon would admit to that even if it were true.