Spam is a huge issue these days and is fully intended to either plant a virus on your computer to get information (personal and financial) or to get you to click a link (known as phishing) to get your information. Here is a text example of such an email that was just reported to me. I removed the links for your safety. In the body of the message the spammer was asking the recipient to log in. That was the trap. It actually lead to a different website that looks a lot like the usps. The website had a malicious script that loaded spyware into the browser and it had a form for the user to log in with their current paypal credentials. That form was designed to fail and redirect to a reset password page. There the user would be asked for more information to “verify their identity”.
I see these attacks all the time. Just letting you know its not a great idea to believe everything you get in your email. Today I received a similar one from Paypal.com. Instead I opened a browser – and logged directly into paypal.com. I got them on the phone to verify the security of my account and review recent transactions. Then I sent them the mail server logs and message for the spoof email I received by forwarding that message to spoof@paypal.com where they will research the attack further.
Have a great day!
Midnightech
————————— Body of Spoof mail with phishing links —————-
Subject: USPS postage invoice.
Acct #: 9641389
Dear client:
This is an email confirmation for your order of 5 online shipping label(s) with postage. Your credit card will be charged the following amount:
Transaction Number: #1225992
Print Date/Time: 03/11/2012 02:30 PM CST Postage Amount: $20.06 Credit Card Number: XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX
Priority Mail Regional Rate Box B # 6256 7825 6297 3496 7698 (Sequence Number 1 of 1)
For further information, please log on to www.usps.com/clicknshipand go to your Shipping Historyor visit our Frequently Asked Questions.
You can refund your unused postage labels up to 10 days after the issue date by logging on to your Click-N-Ship Account.
Thank you for choosing the United States Postal Service
Click-N-Ship: The Online Shipping Solution
Click-N-Ship has just made on line shipping with the USPS even better.
New Enhanced International Label and Customs Form: Updated Look and Easy to Use!
* * * * * * * *
This is an automatically generated message. Please do not respond