Attempted Fraud - Asking for PayPal info

FYI, I just received an official looking request from "PayPal" asking me to Confirm my PayPal information including password, bank account number, etc.
What does this have to do with Astromart? It was sent to my email address that is Only used for Astromart. The only communications, etc. to this email address, come via Astromart. An add I ran on Astromart said I preferred PayPal. Hence " [email protected] " is trying to rip people off by stealing their account information.

Please be careful! As all legitimate services state, "We do not ask for passwords, account numbers, or sensity information, Every."

rahji duarte is a computer 'expert' systems guy- look for him to hack as well.

This is getting more common, unfortunately. Just follow this one rule:

NEVER, ever, ever, ever, ever, EVER punch a reply to an email from ebay or paypal that requires putting in any account-related or password-type info, or click any link embedded in an email from ebay or paypal that automatically takes you somewhere. Don't use any checkout/paypal buttons that get emailed to you even if its by the seller you're buying from, even if it appears to come through ebay, or wherever, you don't know if it's real or what sort of plans he has for your future. The scammers have gotten skilled at creating lookalike websites so if you need to check out something just go into your web browser and independently go to your account to see what's going on or if you need to update or confirm something or whatever.

I just got something like this from a "[email protected]" wanting me to go to a web site to verify my eBay information. If I try and go to his site I get a "You are not authorized to view this page" message.

It is quite common to receive emails that purport to come from EBAY asking for account information, including id, password, credit card number, expiration date, address etc. I have received several in the last few weeks.

The emails are not from EBAY. They look very realistic, and in some ways they conform to the 'rules' that EBAY states should be used in identifying emails and web links from them - for example, the URL should conform to a specific address. The emails I have received include links that look like secure links to EBAY, but in fact are links to some other site with a form that sucks your information to who knows where.

The information you unwittingly supply by filling out one of these forms can be used to hijack your EBAY account and defraud other innocent EBAY users, using your good feedback to avoid suspicion long enough for a transaction to go through.

Point of fact - my brother recently was interested in a high end canon digital camera - the seller stated that he was a German customs officer selling confiscated goods. (ya right!!) Checking the sellers feedback showed that the same guy had recently bought a coupon to a restaurant in Kansas. Very unlikely to be the same guy - so the account had obviously been hijacked.

NEVER, NEVER, EVER, fill out any form that comes to you as a result of an EMAIL! In my case, several of the emails were directed to a company employee who was no longer with the company, and NEVER had an EBAY account anyway.

Basically, these emails are a dangerous form of SPAM. You can infer nothing from the email adress they sent the message to, except that it is now a SPAM target. A high percentage of random users will have an EBAY account, so that is what they are relying on.

ALSO NOTE that even if you have an Email address you use for a single purpose (like astromart), there are VIRUSes out there that will propogate your address to all and sundry, and the virus may reside on some other astromarter's computer which found your address in the guys address book.

Malcolm.

If you use a Macintosh this stuff mostly doesn't happen. Probably not any technical reason. More likely you are just in such a small market segment you don't seem worth harrassing. But it's nice anyway.

Steve