Help! Yahoo!Xtra account sending spam...

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andrew027

1286 posts

Uber Geek

#89389 1-Sep-2011 11:49

I don't know if this has been asked before. I did a quick search through this forum and couldn’t find any relevant threads...

I run Outlook 2010 on my home PC. This is the only mail client I use from home. If I need to check my home email from work or a friend/relative's house, I will sometimes use the Yahoo mail service - clicking the Mail link on xtra.co.nz (nz.yahoo.com), but that's pretty rare.

Friends are advising me that immediately after sending an email to my xtra.co.nz address, they are occasionally getting a piece of junk mail, supposedly sent by my address, telling them how happy I am with the iPad I just bought. I regularly run a range of scans over my PC, which have detected nothing. I have no record of these junk emails on my PC or Sent Items Outlook folder, etc. but have seen a couple in the Sent folder on Yahoo!Xtra mail. This makes me think that perhaps my Yahoo!Xtra mail has been hacked, and the spam is being sent from my account on the Yahoo server, not my from my PC. I have therefore changed my account password, a couple of times, but the spam is still being sent.

I have contacted Telecom and Yahoo, who have both shown no interest whatsoever. Can anyone here advise what I can do to track down where these emails originate from, and get rid of them once and for all?

Oblivian

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#514981 1-Sep-2011 11:56

I suspect if they look at the properties of the message, you will likely find the source path and return email differ. And may not come from you at all

Its quite likely their PCs have malware, and are looking at their recent sent to/address book and going "woohoo.. a new email address to use as a spoof"

Get one of them forwarded to you AS AN ATTACHMENT. To open and evaluate its headers if they are not savvy

freitasm

BDFL - Memuneh
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Geekzone

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#514988 1-Sep-2011 12:02

If he can see the spam on his SENT folder, then it's not a spoof - it's someone using his account on a web-based interface, or his PC is compromised.

Oblivian

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#515034 1-Sep-2011 13:13

Whoops. Woke up too early. Overlooked the 2nd bold wording.

scorpiworld

192 posts

Master Geek

#515127 1-Sep-2011 15:28

I had a similar problem after buying an android phone and downloaded 1 too many apps, that 1 stole my password and started sending people "free offers". Kind of embarrassing for an "IT Expert" to get hacked.

The emails were showing up in my sent items folder (being sent at 4am etc…) after changing my email password and deleting my phone apps it stopped.

freitasm

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#515185 1-Sep-2011 16:57

That's hardly getting hacked, more like social engineering. But yes, it's similar. The interesting thing is we are giving away a licence for Symantec Mobile Security and some people replied saying "don't need security on mobile"... Oh yes, about that.

blakamin

4431 posts

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Inactive user

#515222 1-Sep-2011 17:44

scorpiworld: I had a similar problem after buying an android phone and downloaded 1 too many apps, that 1 stole my password and started sending people "free offers". Kind of embarrassing for an "IT Expert" to get hacked.

The emails were showing up in my sent items folder (being sent at 4am etc…) after changing my email password and deleting my phone apps it stopped.

What app was it??

nix

147 posts

Master Geek

#515227 1-Sep-2011 17:49

I had a client with the same problem. The holiday auto-reply online had been "hijacked" and was automatically sending out a spam message every time something was sent to the account.

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andrew027

1286 posts

Uber Geek

#515412 1-Sep-2011 22:59

Hey Nix
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. That was the problem!

I had already checked Outlook for "out of office" or autoreply messages, but I didn't even know there was such a thing as a "vacation response" in Yahoo's webmail. But after poking around for a while I found it, and there was that damned iPad spam. The text has been cleared, the vacation response turned off, and my password changed again, just for good measure.

Thanks again. I was beginning to get very p*ss*d off with that, as were many of my friends!