Unsolicited E'Mail

[pensioner]

I went into my mail this morning as I do every morning, and in my inbox is a mail from an American company acknowledging receipt of 3 items returned to them.
The name on the receipt under "customer" is not mine and I've never heard of either the customer or the company.
Has anyone had a similar experience, and how do they have my E'mail address.

 

[Dustydog]

As a rule thumb it is best not to open any unfamiliar email. Delete and delete from the deleted folder.
They are phishing to enter your system. Most of this junk is automatically redirected to my junk mail.
More computer versed forumites will tell you more I am sure

 

[Dodger524]

I went into my mail this morning as I do every morning, and in my inbox is a mail from an American company acknowledging receipt of 3 items returned to them.
The name on the receipt under "customer" is not mine and I've never heard of either the customer or the company.
Has anyone had a similar experience, and how do they have my E'mail address.

As Dustydog said they are on a phishing trip. There are many variations on this message. Just delete it.

 

[Hutch]

Yes Pensioner, lots of thing like this, we have a Tax rebate for you and need your details , your Paypal account needs to be revalidated , and the best ones are the We have 18 billion dollars in anaccount and need an honest person to Laundry it for us , please give me your Bank details. Normally from West Africa.
Just don't bother with them.

 

[otherclive]

Your email has probably been sold on at some stage. The company who are currently in the news Cambridge Analytics are reported to hold many personal data elements relating to every U.K. citizen, Europeans and US and others. Yet some object to GCHQ mining data for security purposes. It’s all out there and the more you interact electronically the more data is held on you.
I recently created a Google map and in it up popped my arrival and departure dates for campsites booked via CMHC were the confirmation emails had come back to my gmail inbox. Google maps had extracted this information as I created my route. Helpful or scary?

 

[Mel]

The one I heard about on the radio recently was where you get rung up by a person claiming to be from your bank or whatever and giving you sufficient of your personal details for you to think that they are genuine. They then talk you through resetting your password. What has really happened is that your personal details have already been hacked and the person on the other end is just trying to get access to the rest of your account. Apparently they are very convincing. If anyone gets such a phone call, don't do it, and ring your bank to check it out.
Mel

 

[ProfJohnL]

The one I heard about on the radio recently was where you get rung up by a person claiming to be from your bank or whatever and giving you sufficient of your personal details for you to think that they are genuine. They then talk you through resetting your password. What has really happened is that your personal details have already been hacked and the person on the other end is just trying to get access to the rest of your account. Apparently they are very convincing. If anyone gets such a phone call, don't do it, and ring your bank to check it out.
Mel

Word of warning, don't ring your bank immediately, as some scammers hold the line open and feed dialing tone sounds down the line and you could be talking to them thinking it's your bank.

Either use a different phone, or try ringing a friend or relatives number. If you can't get through you know the scammers are still keeping your phone open

 

[rubbernecker]

Had a telephone call from "Roger" how are you today he says in very eastern accent.I said if your name is Roger then my name is Mohamid,he rang off, how rude !! hmy: