I was the recent victim of Hotmail account hack  (...yesterday)
and some spam was sent to everyone on my distribution list  (..all 400 people ! )

Many have replied back to me to report the spam,
but because the hack exceeded my daily mail-out allowance,
I can't send an e-mail for 24hrs, so I can't reply.

What I want to know is how this happened...

I filter out all spam e-mails directly to the trash,
I never open ANY attachments (even from trusted sources ),
I use Norton Anti-virus, check for Malware often, and of course never respond to phishing scams.
(...my PC checks-out to be clean and virus-free )

The only "questionable" thing I did was to book a rental car on-line using Expedia.com
using that account.  (...but I was never asked to provide a password ).

So how did my account get hacked ? And how did someone get my password (...or did they ?)
I've now changed my password, so I'm hoping this will avoid this from happening again,
...but I don't know for sure.

Anyone know how this happens, or how to avoid it ?

I'm pretty tech-savvy and I never do "stupid" on-line stuff...

LMK,
Thanks,
Steph

Could have just been brute force depending on how easy your password is to crack.  

I don't think hotmail disables the logon no matter how many times you fail on the password so that's a possibility.

Website spoofing is also possible, where you thought you were logging into hotmail but actually wernt, I had that happen to me a long time ago.

If you use the same password for multiple accounts, any one of them could have been the source of a leak. Let's say you register on some forum with your hotmail address and the same password. Now if someone hacks the forum site it's a simple matter to get control of your hotmail account.

Your account probably wasnt hacked but you could ( most likely) a victim of a worm virus. Its on your computer and when you login to your Hotmail, Yahoo etc it scans your contact list and sends emails out that too contain the worm, thus affecting other computers. It happened to me and I have the same filters and a near impossible password. I also use different passwords for everythin....

Quoted from briguy

Your account probably wasnt hacked but you could ( most likely) a victim of a worm virus. Its on your computer and when you login to your Hotmail, Yahoo etc it scans your contact list and sends emails out that too contain the worm, thus affecting other computers.

Assuming that was the case..

How would one find such a worm ?


S.

Most malware can be identified by its "signature". Since you got replies about the spam, presumably some of them will include the subject and body of the message which was sent from your account, name of any attachment(s), etc. Google the key words/phrases which appear in all cases and it should turn up something which tells you more about the situation.

Quoted from tinyrodent

Most malware can be identified by its "signature". Since you got replies about the spam, presumably some of them will include the subject and body of the message which was sent from your account, name of any attachment(s), etc. Google the key words/phrases which appear in all cases and it should turn up something which tells you more about the situation.

Tried that ...

The e-mails all had one of two different Titles

artistic  ?      < where ? is  a random letter>
financial ?      < where ? is  a random letter>

The bodies of either e-mails were different,
but both pointed to the same site.

"Website: welup.com
Email: welup_01@188.com
MSN: welup_01@hotmail.com
I am sure you will get many surprise and benefits.
Greetings! "

I did a google search on WELUP, but didn't find much
other than a few other people who were also victims,
but nothing about what the worm/virus is, or how to eliminate it...

Weird...


Steph

Yeah that's a weird one. If the problem occurs again after changing the password then it's likely you have malware. Try some other detection software to find it. If it doesn't then your password was likely compromised somehow before.

Be sure to check your Hotmail account settings for any undesirable changes e.g. vacation response, junk filter, etc.

Quoted from tinyrodent

Yeah that's a weird one. If the problem occurs again after changing the password then it's likely you have malware. Try some other detection software to find it. If it doesn't then your password was likely compromised somehow before.

Be sure to check your Hotmail account settings for any undesirable changes e.g. vacation response, junk filter, etc.

I used two Malware programs  ( MalwareBytes, and PC Tools Spyware doctor )
and nothing was found.

I also checked all my Hotmail settings, and they look fine...

I'll have to assume that this was one-time-only hack,
and I hope having changed my password with solve the problem.

Keeping my fingers crossed...

Thanks,
Steph

OH!! That's the e-mail I received from you asking me to take your pins off your hands...for free.... A!H !H !H

Good think I did not rent a cube van yet!!!

tartagliag

And here I thought you were sending me an email to chew the fat, and you SPAM me you schmuck!

HEY!! Sparky, can I try your chair? I'm having a bad day and I need to relax...for a while!!!

A!H! AH!

Nice!!!

tartagliag