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Geek Culture / Fake PayPal Email

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Uncle Sam
19
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 23rd Jul 2005
Location: West Coast, USA
Posted: 28th Mar 2009 23:06 Edited at: 28th Mar 2009 23:08
Link
I can't believe I almost fell for this:

(do not try the link in the quote!)

Quote: "Dear PayPal Member,

As part of our security measures, we regularly screen activity in the
PayPal system. During a recent screening, we noticed an issue
regarding your account.

For your protection, we have limited access to your account until
additional security measures can be completed. We apologize for any
inconvenience this may cause.

This might be due to either of the following reasons:

1. A recent change in your personal information (i.e. change of
address,e-mail address).
2. An inability to accurately verify your selected option of payment
due to an internal error within our processors.

Please update and verify your information by checking the link below:
(if you can't open it just copy the link in your internet browser)

http://Paypal-accounts-update.com/index.htm

We thank you for your prompt attention to this matter. Please
understand that this is a security measure intended to help protect you and
your account. We apologize for any inconvenience.


Sincerely,
PayPal Account Review Department


-------------------------------------------
Copyright © 1999-2009 PayPal. All rights reserved."


I almost clicked it because it was from [email protected], but if you look at the address of the link, it does not appear to be a link to PayPal.com. I logged into my PayPal and there were no messages or anything. Watch out for this one!

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heyufool1
16
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 14th Feb 2009
Location: My quiet place
Posted: 28th Mar 2009 23:13 Edited at: 28th Mar 2009 23:13
Link
I'm so tempted to follow that link
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Jeku
Moderator
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 4th Jul 2003
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Posted: 28th Mar 2009 23:14
Link
I get these almost every day. I pretty much delete all my emails from Paypal unless it's a receipt straight after a purchase.

North Korea 2007 Tour Pictures
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Grandma
19
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 26th Dec 2005
Location: Norway, Guiding the New World Order
Posted: 28th Mar 2009 23:58
Link
You can be pretty certain it's not official when they leave out your username and just say something like "dear [something] member". That's the first thing you should look for.

This message was brought to you by Grandma industries.

Making yesterdays games, today!
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tha_rami
19
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 25th Mar 2006
Location: Netherlands
Posted: 29th Mar 2009 02:38
Link
Actually, if you get such an e-mail, just go to the site manually (PayPal, Gmail, whatever) and check if there's a notice on the main page. If there is, read it and only click on links there. Never use links to get to login pages for systems that involve money or personal data.

Besides that, Grandma pointed out a good consistency, too.


A mod has been erased by your signature because it was larger than 600x120
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Oolite
19
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 28th Sep 2005
Location: Middle of the West
Posted: 29th Mar 2009 02:49
Link
I also get tons of these, i usually delete most things in my inbox after browsing through the titles or senders anyway. Its pretty clear that 'Paypal-accounts-update' isn't the paypal site anyway...


I'll finish them whenever i can be bothered.
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Uncle Sam
19
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 23rd Jul 2005
Location: West Coast, USA
Posted: 29th Mar 2009 02:53
Link
Since I just recently set up my PayPal account this is one of my first (if not my first) fake PayPal emails. Thanks for the tips.

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Jeku
Moderator
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 4th Jul 2003
Location: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Posted: 29th Mar 2009 03:00
Link
Quote: "Since I just recently set up my PayPal account this is one of my first (if not my first) fake PayPal emails. Thanks for the tips."


The phishers have no real way of knowing whether you have a Paypal account or not. I've received tons of phishing emails from American banks that I don't have accounts for. They're just randomly sent.

North Korea 2007 Tour Pictures
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Yodaman Jer
User Banned
Posted: 29th Mar 2009 03:11
Link
I remember I used to get a ton of spam emails from places I hadn't even heard of!!

But that's pretty normal, seeing as they were all advertisements for items of interest (I shopped around for about a year for a decent video camera), which were electronics. Strangely, I haven't gotten any in about a year...

Good thing you didn't click that link Uncle Sam! That email is definitely 'phishy'.


Sorry, I had to do that...



Check out my programming blog!
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