Customer Woes…. Hotmail Account hacked….
So this morning got an email from a customer. It reads…..
From: p**** o**** [mailto:p****@hotmail.co.uk]
Sent: 18 October 2010 08:32
To: undisclosed-recipients:
Subject: Urgent
Good day , how are you today,i’m sorry for this urgent email, i’m so distraught due to the situation of things right now, we in Cyprus, for a short program, unfortunately James had an accident, worse of it was that cash, cellphone and credit cards were missing it’s such a crazy and terrific experience for us, we need help
paying the hospital and hotel bills and flying back home for further treatment, the authorities have not being helpful, they already did their part,but the good thing is that we still have our passports, i hope to raise the money , I will appreciate any amount you can afford to lend me till i get back to England I’ll refund it immediatley i get back home,get back to me as soon as you get this email. Please keep this between us.
best regards
Stephanie and James
So this came as a bit of a shock to my customer. I have changed the names above to protect my customers details.
So how did this happen you may ask.
An email sent to my customer yesterday evening from Hotmail requesting that the customer returns an email with her customer Username and Password for the account and that she should do it urgently because her account would be closed if not. It looked very real and had all of the Hotmail logos and very much like an email you would get from Hotmail. But they never ask you for your username and password in an email or over the telephone. She of coarse replied to the email after reading it three times with the information asked and thought nothing of it.
This morning at 8:32 all of her friends received the above email.
This was reported to the police and is now ongoing.
Now the customer cant access her emails because the fraudsters changed her password and also changed her alternative account details. So we are having to go down the hard route of getting her account sorted out with Microsoft.
Moral of the story…. Dont give out your username and password. Microsoft wont email you for your username and password. It may look real but these guys are very clever at that. You have been warned 
Thanks for sharing this Darren. I hate emails of this nature. Some look convincing, some ask for details and unfortunately some probably achieve their aims.
Not a problem Robert. Appreciate you taking the time to leave a comment. Sadly most people think to themselves that they wouldn’t be so gullible. But these people make things sound so legitimate that it often wont take much for them to get what they want.