Back when Seeby posted here and Orcon was new and shiny they offered free lifetime emails to NZers. When I heard (here) I quickly signed up for a couple of them. You can never have enough email addresses right? (I like to keep 'groups' separate, a different email for a different purpose.) Anyway, back then I didn't worry too much about strong passwords and, as I don't use this particular account much now hadn't changed it. It was a seven-letter word that a dictionary attack would have found easily. (I have Tbird set up to gather emails from perhaps 10 different email accounts from around the web...) I did use this email as a 'return to' for Usenet for a couple years, ending over 18 months ago... A few days ago my Tbird inbox was getting flooded with returned emails, hundreds and hundreds of them - apparently coming from that addy. (Then there came a flood of hourly re-try bounces....) So, for the first time since I was an Orcon customer 5+ years ago I went to their webmail page to change my password to something more obscure. (I have a couple 'friends' who use that address to contact me so didn't want to dump it.) While I was there I checked the 'sent email' folder and discovered 10 emails sent from the webmail page on 18/08/12 purporting to come from ExxonMobil, typical "You have won..." spam. There was also another 10 similar emails dated 26/11/12 but this time supposedly coming from Gazprom Oil. So, my account had been compromised for a while - I just didn't know it. It seems that initially it had been used via the webmail interface but this month accessed remotely, through SMTP or IMAP. So, I'd changed the password to a mix of letters, numbers and symbols and was about to log off when I decided to have one last look around the account. That's when I found that an 'alternate identity' had been set up (presumably for getting back into the account if I changed the PW). It was: Full Name: Gazprom Oil Email: [my orcon addy] Reply to: I very quickly deleted it and changed the password again, just to be sure. As I'd never heard of Gazprom Oil I did a quick Google and that's when I found this: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/technolog/anonymous-targets-oil-companies-email-hack-887067 Probably has nothing to do with my account but who knows? <shrug> Anyway, info posted FYI. Hopefully I've got it sorted now. -- /Shaun. "Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a cozy little classification in the DSM." David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
Same thing happened to my boy a few motnhs back (and the fsckers changed the password). Orcon support were great in getting it sorted.
Bugger! They're not very secure maybe? Handy to know they helped sort it out. (Although I registered that one under an assumed name - in case they took exception to me having more than one email addy - and don't remember DOB etc if needed to re-set the password. :-/) Cheers, -- /Shaun. "Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a cozy little classification in the DSM." David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
LOL! Nah mate, I'd rather keep out of the spotlight. -- /Shaun. "Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a cozy little classification in the DSM." David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
