question re spyware

18 years ago

I have a question which I think might pertain to spyware, but I'm not sure.

This has to do with a friend who uses hotmail for his e-mail. Yesterday I received an e-mail from him which had been addressed to myself as well as everyone in his address book. I questioned him about this, and he wrote back and said -

"I went into my contacts this a.m. and there was NOTHING there!

I think I'm cursed when it comes to computers!

I have no viruses.I was looking up printers on the internet last nite.I can't remember doing anything wrong!"

So - all his contact information is gone, according to him - and we were all sent the advertisement. Would this have to do with spyware or a trojan??

Has anyone heard of this before.

Elaine

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Comments (8)

owbist
18 years ago
Elaine I had friend with a (maybe) similar incident and I spent ages trying to clean off an already clean computer. Seems this lady uses MSN Messenger and at one point was asked if she wanted to see who was blocking her. She clicked without reading properly and the site asked for login name and password. Foolishly she went ahead and her MSN was compromised.

If this might be your friend's issue tell him to change his MSN password sudden like so they cannot use it to harass his contact list.

Regarding the missing address book do a search for *.wab if it is Outlook Express
Elaine_Canada
Original Author
18 years ago
I'll definitely ask him about that - I don't know if he uses Messenger or not. Gosh you have to be soooo careful.

Elaine
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Elaine_Canada
Original Author
18 years ago
This is the second time for this to happen. Today I rec'd a message from the same friend. This time with Subject line saying My new Mobile Phone -
The message says -
my new mobile phone gave me more happiness than ever, I upload many theme for it here, Share with you. http://moblive.vicp.net/

So, this time I wrote and asked if he sent this? He wrote back and told me no - and could I report this somehow as phishing or a scam.

What would be causing this to happen - is someone using his e-mail address and how can he stop this?

Elaine
owbist
18 years ago
You might try right clicking on the header of this email. Click Properties/Details/Message source. Expand to full screen and look for the senders address. This might give you a clue as to whether it came from his computer.

He should seriously consider changing the password he has with his ISP to combat external use of his computer if it is happening.

I would do an online scan at Trend Micro or other site plus I would run SUPERAntispyware. Recently I had a difficult machine to clean and was totally amazed at what SUPERAntispyware found after using other clean up tools first. It seems to be a brilliant program.
Elaine_Canada
Original Author
18 years ago
I already looked in Message Source and it said

from unknown (HELO ip03.eastlink.ca) ([24.222.39.36])
(envelope-sender

after envelope-sender it had my friends hotmail address that he uses.

So - I suspect that's the real address it came from. I will tell him about Super Antispyware - I went to the website and assume you download the free copy and scan (or I suppose the full copy and use it for the length of time allowed).

You are suggesting there is spyware on his computer then - he has scanned with Avast and Ad-aware. I'll tell him to download the other one.

Elaine
owbist
18 years ago
Well if his computer is sending messages without his knowing then undoubtedly he is compromised. Does he have his firewall enabled? Hopefully he has something other than the MS firewall protecting him but it may have been disabled by the 'visitor'. You have to assume anything is possible.

You mention AdAware, is this 2007 or SE version? He should have switched to AdAware2007 by now. His Avast is just offer anti virus protection.
ravencajun Zone 8b TX
18 years ago
http://www.superantispyware.com/index.html
Definitely have him install and use Superantispyware it is in my opinion the best of the free antispyware scanners.

But it really sounds to me like his email has been taken over if not his entire pc.
He should discontinue use of that email address for anything personal or sensitive. Plus consider that anything that he did have in there is now up for grabs.
If I were him I would close that email account, let his ISP know about it, and set up a new one with a very secure password, which is NOT a real word but a combination of letters and symbols. NEVER make a password out of a real word they can be cracked in seconds.

To see if his pc has been taken over and is now a part of a zombie bot owned by some hacker I would highly suggest he go to one of the Pro Tech Help forums and let them tell him exactly what to install and how to check. They are excellent at this kind of thing. These are some of them.
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/cleanup
http://www.castlecops.com/
http://www.temerc.com/forums/
http://forums.whatthetech.com/forums.html

Visiting some of those forums and telling them in detail what is happening they will be able to guide him on what to do.
Elaine_Canada
Original Author
18 years ago
Thanks for all the followups and suggestions. I did have him download Superspyware and he said it found and deleted over 100 items, so hopefully this has fixed his problem.

I haven't rec'd another false e-mail from him in the meantime.
Thanks for the answers and all the help.

Elaine

question re spyware

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owbist

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question re spyware

Comments (8)

owbist

Elaine_CanadaOriginal Author

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Elaine_CanadaOriginal Author

owbist

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Elaine_Canada
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