WARNING: Beware of spoof emails -- please read

[starroute]

I've gotten three "spoof" emails in the last day. One claimed to be an order confirmation from Amazon. The second claimed to be from Paypal and wanted me to verify my account by sending them my debit card information! The third claimed to be from Ebay and said that my account would become unusable unless I clicked on the link given and verified my account information.

All three of them were clearly fraudulent. The fake Amazon message may have simply been a form of spam, since the content was an ad for various Windows and Adobe software at about 1/5 the normal price. But the other two were definitely designed to extract personal information which would enable the perpetrators to engage in identity theft.

If you get anything like this, please do not fall for it. Paypal and Ebay both have specific procedures on their contact pages to help you identify these spoofed emails and forward copies to them. In the case of the fake Amazon message, I simply emailed them a query. All three responded almost immediately to confirm that the messages had not come from them.

Be careful what you click on -- it never hurts to check before acting.

[Kathy in Cambridge]

1. Happened to me too-I deleted them fearing a worm or virus

:scared:

[liberalhistorian]

2. Me, too, and

I got them when I don't even have an account with ebay or Paypal, any email even remotely like that is IMMEDIATELY DELETED!

[alfredo]

3. there is one with the subject, "Hello" and another with "Test"

Both have attachments. I noted the suffix .pif on them. I know they are bad news.

Glad I only run OSX and Linux.

[blackcat77]

4. My wife got a .DAT file as an attachment yesterday

It was supposed to be a .DOC and she caught the problem and notified the person who sent her the file.

That stuff is EVERYWHERE nowadays...