My Hotmail Got Hacked

[mightymike]

Somehow somebody got into my Hotmail account and sent an email from that account to everyone in my constact list about some Viagra webite.. I changed my password when my girlfriend told me about it. I apologize to anyone who got one of these emails.

[myfoot]

Yeah it happened to my ebay account once. Got spam from myself!

[jimmy_j]

Not hacked. You have a virus. Its a bot. Go to - http://malwarebytes.org/

[mightymike]

But my computer wasn't even on when these were sent today around 3:35 PM. I think I hadn't been on in a couple days.

[jimmy_j]

Hmm? That is odd.

[jimmy_j]

Sorry, Double post. I would still scan that box for malware.

[mightymike]

That box? You mean my computer? I'm running a Macafee scan right now.

[mightymike]

I'm going to have to start checking email without a browser. Good advice here thx

[vanhalen5150]

Same thing happened to me about 5 months ago. I was asked by what seemed like my own email account to verify my password for security reasons. All my friends got emails from "me" with the most crazy shit you have ever read. Why would someone even bother? I change my password every month.

[spaceace76]

gmail has tougher security, and you can link your hotmail address to it to send and receive email from the one account.

you should also make sure there isn't too much personal info online about you. sometimes just googling about a person can give you enough info to access their bank account, email, whatever. it's much easier than you'd think.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... ocial-hack" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

i'd also recommend ditching mcaffee for the previously mentioned malwarebyte's antimalware. asking mcaffee to find viruses is like asking a blind guy how cloudy the sky is, IME anyway... the free version of MBAM is better than most of the commercial stuff that gets thrown onto PC's as a default

and if you aren't using firefox already, you ought to be. to be exact, Opera is the most secure browser. i just like FF for the flexibility and the addons. there's even one that removes ads from web pages. you'd be surprised how nice the internet looks without all the crap in the way

[BAinFL]

when it comes to attachments, no matter what you're running

1. Save never open
2. Scan
3. Then open

Malware bytes is a great cleaner program. Keep it updated. It will save your butt when your AV program gets hosed by malware.

A lot of times youre infected with something that disables parts of your AV program. If your PC is acting weird, expect that you're infected with something, even if your Brand XYZ anti virus says youre fine.

When trying to check for an infection and clean it, disable system restore, hard boot into safe mode, run MAB get rid of whatever you can. Hard boot again into safe mode again. Run your normal AV scanner/cleaner. A lot of times fully cleaning a PC can take multiple passes with multiple products.

Hope some of this helps. As a former 15 year PC tech and IT nerd I've seen it all in terms of virus infections. The stuff that gets on your system nowadays is often multi-layered. By the time you figure out you've been infected by something, there's usually multiple types of malware all having invaded your system. Never assume your PC is clean. Check it properly (safe mode after a hard boot and system restore disabled is the ONLY way to do this properly) and do this with at LEAST 2 different AV programs.

Good luck! And feel free to post if you need any additional help. Sounds like there's more than a couple of nerds here who can help out =P

[frenchie]

this is how i usually do , it's brutal but it works whatever the problem ..... next install you make once it's clean and all our software are installed before setting up internet, make a ghost of your install and put it on a dvd so you have it at hand, then after when your pc get too badly infected , reload your ghost and on and on , so you always have the clean primary install , and save often your data ... dealing with update and zillions not free of antivirus softwares what a major pain in the butt , i like it pretty direct ; problem ? --> wipe out the damn thing ^^ and build new from the ground up , saves time quite oftenly... oh and my internet is on a mac , i guess it helps too

[Xplorer]

sure. i use myself acronis true image, very simple and always working. so you have your softwares and datas always saved, and in 15 minutes you have your computer as new, with all your softares installed, all your emails etc ...

[JWR]

Sonofabitch I got it on my work laptop just by opening the forum. Fuck I like this forum but who would do that ? Locked me up and tries to extort $300. Find em George