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Spam is being sent to my entire email address book- advice needed!

A

angelasb

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 28, 2008
2
0
My email account has been used to send spam email... by an ip address that seems to be in China. The emails are being sent to my entire address book- not to strangers- but my internal yahoo address book. What can I do in this case? Is it a virus?

I notice that most forums/websites about this issue suggest that it just "looks" like the emails are being sent by my email account because the spam tool fakes the sender's email address. It seems like a different issue if the emails are being sent to my entire address book...

Please help. I am not sure where to start or what I can do about it.
 
O

operator207

macrumors 6502
Jul 24, 2007
487
0
angelasb said:
My email account has been used to send spam email... by an ip address that seems to be in China. The emails are being sent to my entire address book- not to strangers- but my internal yahoo address book. What can I do in this case? Is it a virus?

I notice that most forums/websites about this issue suggest that it just "looks" like the emails are being sent by my email account because the spam tool fakes the sender's email address. It seems like a different issue if the emails are being sent to my entire address book...

Please help. I am not sure where to start or what I can do about it.
Click to expand...

You say "internal Yahoo Address Book". Does this Address Book reside on Yahoo's servers too? If so, maybe someone has hacked your Yahoo Address Book, or maybe you opened an email that grabbed it all somehow.

Regardless, they have your Address Book contents, even if you change passwords at Yahoo, they would still have them. This happens with Viruses on Windows where the virus grabs your Outlook Address Book.

It almost sounds more personal than what a virus would normally do. Which is grab your AB, then send emails from the AB email addresses to the AB email addresses. Yours sounds like its spamming using your email address to those AB email addresses.

Not to sound rude, but have you angered anyone using your Yahoo email address, or angered someone who knows your Yahoo address, or could gain access to your Yahoo Address Book? I ask because this sounds a bit more personal than most.

The worst case is your going to need to change your Yahoo email address, and definitely change your password. Then tell all your contacts that you have changed your email address.
 
A

angelasb

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 28, 2008
2
0
operator207 said:
You say "internal Yahoo Address Book". Does this Address Book reside on Yahoo's servers too? If so, maybe someone has hacked your Yahoo Address Book, or maybe you opened an email that grabbed it all somehow.

Regardless, they have your Address Book contents, even if you change passwords at Yahoo, they would still have them. This happens with Viruses on Windows where the virus grabs your Outlook Address Book.

It almost sounds more personal than what a virus would normally do. Which is grab your AB, then send emails from the AB email addresses to the AB email addresses. Yours sounds like its spamming using your email address to those AB email addresses.

Not to sound rude, but have you angered anyone using your Yahoo email address, or angered someone who knows your Yahoo address, or could gain access to your Yahoo Address Book? I ask because this sounds a bit more personal than most.

The worst case is your going to need to change your Yahoo email address, and definitely change your password. Then tell all your contacts that you have changed your email address.
Click to expand...

My address book is on the yahoo server. I don't know who could have gained access to my email account. I checked the IP address and it seems to be coming from China. It has been sent out multiple times to the thousand+ addresses in my address book. The email is some kind of advertisement jpg.

I ran a virus check on my computer and it did not find anything. If it is a virus infecting my account on the yahoo server, could it be located and disinfected on my local drives?

I am going to keep trying a bit before I switch email accounts...

Thank you.
 
O

operator207

macrumors 6502
Jul 24, 2007
487
0
angelasb said:
My address book is on the yahoo server. I don't know who could have gained access to my email account. I checked the IP address and it seems to be coming from China. It has been sent out multiple times to the thousand+ addresses in my address book. The email is some kind of advertisement jpg.

I ran a virus check on my computer and it did not find anything. If it is a virus infecting my account on the yahoo server, could it be located and disinfected on my local drives?

I am going to keep trying a bit before I switch email accounts...

Thank you.
Click to expand...

I am trying to say, your Yahoo account's username and password are most likely compromised. They are most likely not in China, but bouncing off a proxy in China. They got into your account, got a copy of your addressbook, and took off with it. You will not find a virus (especially on OS X) that could do this. And if the Yahoo servers had a virus, I would imagine there would be thousands of people complaining about exactly what your going through.

I would suggest, at minimum, change your password. If this was me, I would dump that email address, its going to get into spam blocks, and get a new one.
 
K

kyutih

macrumors newbie
Aug 5, 2008
1
0
it happened to me too few days back. i really have no idea how i got that. i just checked my sent items and found that spam email which was sent to my contacts that i have in my yahoo address book. fortunately i only have 3 contacts since my email is just 2-month old. what i did was changed my password and deleted all my contacts.

i just want to know why it happened and how to prevent it. please help!

here is the spam email...

Subject: Apple iPod touch Digital Media Player

Hi, dear friend
how are you ?
My friend told me an electronics online shopping mall. He bought some Iphones , game consoles and laptops.
They could offer original stuff with very low price.More details,Please Browse the following website.
http://www.brandshop68.com
MSN :brandshop998@hotmail.com
E-mail : brandshop68@yahoo.cn

:apple:
 
C

comeonglos

macrumors newbie
Oct 20, 2008
1
0
brandshop68 is a CON

I can't help you with the hijacking but I would like to warn you and other not to use brandshop68. I unfortunately fell for the CON because I had an email from a friend so I sent 190 euros. After lots of chasing and emailing I got nothing. They didn't reply and stopped me using MSN messenger to them.

DO NOT use brandshop68 it is a CON - that is why they are hijacking email addresses.:(
 
A

afb

macrumors newbie
Aug 31, 2012
1
0
This has also happened to me as the sender. AND, I have received these messages from friends who use a different carrier.

About 6 months ago an email went out to everyone in my address book. Spam message. Some link...looked pretty benign....I don't remember. But, how did that happen? I changed my password, no further problems, but still would like to understand.

Couple of days ago, changed my password again. AND, I hate to admit it but I rotate passwords and changed back to the one where this happened. It happened again, almost immediately. Message went out to all in my address book that looked like it was from me as sender. It was a link to a "work at home make money thing." Wouldn't have even known it if a couple of friends hadn't questioned me.

Haven't gotten any satisfaction from my carrier. I don't want to be totally paranoid, but something is going on that we're not being told.
 
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