Gmail attacked?

[Charlie Woody]

Last night I received an unusual email from a friend. It basically said to see the message to click on a link, which opened gmail sign in page, which then opened a BBC news page.

I did not think there was anything untoward but later I went to my sent box and there were lots of sent messages that are not mine!

So I am now thinking that either my Gmail has been accessed by someone else as my sign in, see above, was not to Gmail but a fraud steer, or that my laptop & iPad have been infected by a virus.

Can someone advise me what to do now please?

 

[Graham Orm]

Change the password on that email account and run a decent anti virus. I have kaspersky which works well, but their 'support' have just taken a week to respond to an email requesting advice. (They are based in Oxford as well!!) Sorry off subject there.

If I get an email from a friend that I suspect, I usually send it back asking if they sent it and NEVER open a link unless you are certain it's safe.

 

[NickWelford]

In particular, there are a lot of emails with zip files on them. Unless you are expecting a zip file from someone, DO NOT OPEN IT. Even if you are expecting one, check carefully that it is valid. Almost always they contain a virus.

 

[nathandavies]

I had a similar e-mail yesterday which was flagged as dangerous, and I asked the person if they had sent it and they said no, so they've got into their e-mail. it looks like it's aimed at gmail as you use your sign in for other stuff as well.

Nathan

 

[Charlie Woody]

Thanks guys.

Just looked at Which, and Microsoft Security Essentials for Windows7 is top of their best buy table, it's free too.

I don't see any reviews for iPad anti virus software, can somebody recommend one please?

 

[Charlie Woody]

Just changed my Gmail password & looked at security. It showed a log on from Church Stretton and a password change from same place, but I think the times were when I logged on & changed password. I live near Okehampton.

Now what do I do as I don't see how I can notify Gmail of this?

 

[MMUK]

it looks like it's aimed at gmail as you use your sign in for other stuff as well.

Nathan

I use Gmail for mail but nothing else. I keep refusing a Google+ account on the basis that it's an e-mail account, not a pineappleing social networking account :mrgreen:

 

[RogerS]

....
I don't see any reviews for iPad anti virus software, can somebody recommend one please?

I'm not convinced that you need it TBH. I'd be far rather concerned with anything running Android as that seems to be 'open house'.

 

[NickWelford]

Apple's IOS is pretty robust, although not entirely foolproof. I don't bother with extra protection for my ipad, but I am careful about what I access or open. Anything windows based or android is wide open to the bad guys, which is why most attacks are on those.

 

[carlb40]

I had something similar a few years back with hotmail. Everyone on my contact list kept getting adverts from my account. Some friends had over 20 per day

A password change sorted it.

I have been using MS security essentials now for 2 years and never had any probs since. I find it is also unobrusive during scans.

 

[porker]

I think the advice above is generally good. Remember that GMail, Hotmail, Yahoo and others are web based email solutions and in my experience (I work in information security) a lot of email account compromises are simply brute force password attacks and the OS of the machines used are irrelevant in these cases. Use a strong password and most of these issues will go away. We paid a company that specialising in Penetration Testing to perform a controlled hack on our company IT systems. They cracked nearly 20% of the employee email accounts because they used passwords constructed of really common terms like password1234, sesame and all the others. When hackers attack email accounts they often will brute force thousands of accounts against a list of commonly used passwords. A list of only 100 of the most common passwords will often get good results. My sister got her Gmail account hacked. I asked her what her old password was. It was her dogs name which is freely available on her Facebook account.

 

[Graham Orm]

I've posted this before but I think this is another opportunity.

I have a word document in which I keep hints for about 40 different passwords that I use all the time. The words are made up of the names of old school friends or items that have easily remembered names, such as:

Royal Bank of Scotland current account: The black haired kid at school with a red bike plus the number of cousins I have.

This is un-guessable and would take a computer an age to work out. The password would be JoeBloggs7.

Or: My first car plus Aunty Carols house number: MorrisMinor244

Your old discontinued phone numbers are useful as well....if you can remember them. You simply remind yourself of the address where that number was in use and you have a 7 digit number to add to any password.

The answers to the hints are easily remembered by me. As pointed out by Porker (above), I never use info that can be gleaned from any other internet source. The number of complex passwords you can create is pretty much limitless.

 

[RogerS]

!Err578$%8hT^^FhkkUYYHgfbbYNM178723hdiifmf works for me and is easily remembered \/ :wink:

 

[Graham Orm]

I know someone who uses qwertyuiop (the top line of the keyboard). They simply run their finger across the keys.

 

[joethedrummer]

!Err578$%8hT^^FhkkUYYHgfbbYNM178723hdiifmf works for me and is easily remembered \/ :wink:

Hey Roger,,thats a coincidence,,it works for me as well !!!

 

[Robbo3]

Just looked at Which, and Microsoft Security Essentials for Windows7 is top of their best buy table, it's free too.

Microsoft Security Essentials is very good if you are computer & internet savvy.

You might be better off with one of the other well known free anti-virus programmes ie,
Avast - http://www.avast.com/en-us/index
Avira - http://www.avira.com/en/index
AVG - http://free.avg.com/us-en/homepage
that will make you jump out of your skin if you come across something nasty whereas MSE just presumes that you intended to click that nasty link & just lets it happen.

 

[Charlie Woody]

Just looked at Which, and Microsoft Security Essentials for Windows7 is top of their best buy table, it's free too.

Microsoft Security Essentials is very good if you are computer & internet savvy.

You might be better off with one of the other well known free anti-virus programmes ie,
Avast - http://www.avast.com/en-us/index
Avira - http://www.avira.com/en/index
AVG - http://free.avg.com/us-en/homepage
that will make you jump out of your skin if you come across something nasty whereas MSE just presumes that you intended to click that nasty link & just lets it happen.

I have realised that I am using Windows Vista so without changing to Windows 7 I can't use Microsoft Security Essentials. Took a look at getting Windows 7 but kept going around in circles and still don't know how much it costs to upgrade. It appears my old laptop is compatible with it from the test Microsoft provided, but not sure if my printer is!
I will take a look at the 3 programmes you suggest, thanks.

I was googling for something earlier and noticed it said my location was Church Stretton, see my previous post above. I don't understand why it is not showing my correct location?

 

[MMUK]

Just looked at Which, and Microsoft Security Essentials for Windows7 is top of their best buy table, it's free too.

Microsoft Security Essentials is very good if you are computer & internet savvy.

You might be better off with one of the other well known free anti-virus programmes ie,
Avast - http://www.avast.com/en-us/index
Avira - http://www.avira.com/en/index
AVG - http://free.avg.com/us-en/homepage
that will make you jump out of your skin if you come across something nasty whereas MSE just presumes that you intended to click that nasty link & just lets it happen.

I have realised that I am using Windows Vista so without changing to Windows 7 I can't use Microsoft Security Essentials. Took a look at getting Windows 7 but kept going around in circles and still don't know how much it costs to upgrade. It appears my old laptop is compatible with it from the test Microsoft provided, but not sure if my printer is!
I will take a look at the 3 programmes you suggest, thanks.

I was googling for something earlier and noticed it said my location was Church Stretton, see my previous post above. I don't understand why it is not showing my correct location?

Should be no more than £70 for an upgrade license.

 

[RogerS]

.....

I was googling for something earlier and noticed it said my location was Church Stretton, see my previous post above. I don't understand why it is not showing my correct location?

Possibly because that is where your ISP is located.