stolen e-mail

[Jean in MD]

I signed up for this forum with an e-mail address that I have never used for any other purpose or given out to anyone else. Yesterday that e-mail address was sent an email attempting to make me use it to login to Paypal and steal my Paypal login information. Whether it was stolen from this site or provided by this site, I don't know. But anyone who has provided an e-mail address to this forum should be worried and should consider not using that e-mail address any more.

[rbryan]

Jean, I doubt your email address was stolen. More likely, the scammers used one of several tools to generate common user names and pair them with common domains. They're similar to the the tools used for password cracking, and they're effective. Your best response is to simply delete the email. Never reply or click on any "unsubscribe" link from a fraudulent email. All that does is confirm that the email address is valid.

[Mary F]

Please rest assured your email addresses are never provided by this site. We do not sell or give away the email data that we need to be able to run this site. Your privacy is important to us.

[k0wtz]

i have had this happen it seems to stem from ebay and paypal for me. never a problem from amazon.

it seems there are a lot of people with a lot of time on their hands!!

bob

[C&G in FL]

Has nothing to do with FGRV, eBay, or PayPal. As Robert stated, the scammers will send out emails using common names and a generic wildcard letter (*) or multiple wildcard letters. You would get scam emails even if you never used your email address on any websites.

[Bruce H]

If you have an e-mail address you will get "Paypal" e-mails even if you don't have a Paypal account.

[C&G in FL]

Originally Posted by Bruce H

If you have an e-mail address you will get "Paypal" e-mails even if you don't have a Paypal account.

Yes, but if you check the sender's email address you will see they are NOT from PayPal. It is a scammer phishing for data trying to gain access to PayPal accounts, and as a result, any funds they might contain. I often laugh when I see posts on the apps which identify phone numbers (Mr Number, Hiya, etc.). The solution is simple; do not answer any calls when you don't recognize the caller's number. If everyone followed this simple procedure, the annoyance calls would soon stop. Even a scammer or telephone marketer would give up if nobody is going to answer, ever. If a call is important, the caller will leave a message. Unfortunately, too many people are so stupid they continue to answer every call, and the most stupid ones get scammed. Or they post a complaint, as if they think that will make the problem go away. What is that saying about a fool and his money being easily parted, or if it's too good to be true......

[k0wtz]

carl I am supposing most of this stuff is originating from Nigeria or other such nice places.

Yes we are stupid at times I think one time I disclosed stuff thinking it was from Ebay itself!

Something really weird is I got my billfold stolen in Italy one of the worlds worst and they were slick how they did it. I immediately canceled my c/c but they never attempted to use them.

Last time I was in Italy I rented a car I got some strange emails about a fine for a car I had rented. Every business must be full of crooks over there!

bob

[Byron Kinnaman]

Originally Posted by CPW

Yes, but if you check the sender's email address you will see they are NOT from PayPal. It is a scammer phishing for data trying to gain access to PayPal accounts, and as a result, any funds they might contain. I often laugh when I see posts on the apps which identify phone numbers (Mr Number, Hiya, etc.). The solution is simple; do not answer any calls when you don't recognize the caller's number. If everyone followed this simple procedure, the annoyance calls would soon stop. Even a scammer or telephone marketer would give up if nobody is going to answer, ever. If a call is important, the caller will leave a message. Unfortunately, too many people are so stupid they continue to answer every call, and the most stupid ones get scammed. Or they post a complaint, as if they think that will make the problem go away. What is that saying about a fool and his money being easily parted, or if it's too good to be true......

I thought the quote was "A sucker is born every minute".

[Byron Kinnaman]

Originally Posted by k0wtz

carl I am supposing most of this stuff is originating from Nigeria or other such nice places.
bob

A few years ago I traced a trailer sale scam back to Romania. Nigeria was where most of scams originated many years ago. They were known as 419 scams. Many copiers are out there.

[C&G in FL]

Originally Posted by Byron Kinnaman

I thought the quote was "A sucker is born every minute".

Actually, I am not quoting PT Barnum. The actual quote is "A fool and his money are soon parted." If you feel a need to clarify your thoughts, simply Google the quote to which I initially referred and you can be enlightened. I chose this quote because it refers specifically to unwise "financial" decisions and scam artists are almost 100% about money, whereas a sucker could be someone who has been scammed, the subject of a practical joke, or a person humiliated in any number of scenarios.

[k0wtz]

In my experience there are those who will admit to being scammed and those who wont!!


bob

[k0wtz]

funny the ones who wont admit they never got scammed!!

bob