03-27-2012, 01:30 PM

I got calls and emails yesterday from people in my Contacts saying they got emails from me that I did not send. The emails were directed to only one contact and the subject was Re: 1, Re: 2 and so on. The message was brief before a link, like: Wow, I didnt know you could make money on the internet, then the link.
Im using a Mac Mini 10.7.3 and MAIL. I also have an iPhone. Everything is up to date.
My contacts are only on my mac and iPhone, not imported or available thru my online access to my email account (ATT Yahoo).
Not everyone in my Contacts received these emails, but people who dont know each other got them - people only I have in common in my contacts.
So what the heck has happened?
Did my mac or iPhone get hacked? Is my other info at risk?
If my email got hacked how did they get my contacts?
I sometimes share emails with several of my contacts by BCC. Could it be that I shared an email with the people who received this Spam and the info was hacked off of one of their unprotected PC's?
I ran ClamXav and it found nothing. I have changed my password and security info.
Any help appreciated

03-27-2012, 02:32 PM

Are you using POP, IMAP or even Exchange to send/receive emails on your Mac and iPhone? Can you see the sent emails in your "Sent" folder of Apple Mail? If it's not there, log into the web access for your email account and check that sent folder. Would be interested to know where these emails were sent from...

03-27-2012, 02:54 PM

I am using POP and only thru MAIL on my Mini and iPhone, not via the web.
My MAIL program was open all night and after hearing of the problem, I checked and there were no such messages in my SENT folder on the Mini or iPhone. I then signed into the web access and nothing was there either, but I have that set not to save my sent messages.

03-27-2012, 03:54 PM

If you have a gmail Adress this Might have been a Hack: someone logged into your Account and Sent Emails to all contacts. Had Those Mails coming in myself. Should work with any Other webbased address as well

03-27-2012, 04:14 PM

Thanks but as I said above, this is ATT Yahoo POP email (thru my internet provider) and I only access it thru the MAIL program. The emails only went to a few of my contacts but nobody else would have those same contacts besides me.

03-27-2012, 04:47 PM

If the sent emails are not on your Mac or Phone I'm also thinking that those would have been sent from the web interface. Most likely somebody either guessed your password or used brute force to find the login information and sent it from there.

Most important part now: Change your password to something alphanumeric (lower case and upper case letters, numbers, special characters) with at least 8 characters of length. Set your web interface to save sent messages. That way you can monitor things now. Nothing much you can do about the emails that went out already...

03-27-2012, 07:55 PM

I read somewhere that hackers can write emails and make it look like it was sent from me by putting my email in the FROM.

Is it possible and/or likely that a PC owner got hacked after receiving a group email from me, chose my email to send spam from and sent it to the others in the group from my contact list? Some of the threads I have been reading left me with this impression as being possible and I am still confused because only a few of my contacts received the spam from my account.

Thanks

03-28-2012, 05:23 AM

It is possible and indeed likely, but if your Yahoo (or any provider's) email password is easy to guess, the most likely explanation is that your Yahoo account has been compromised. In any event, I would change the password to be sure.

03-28-2012, 08:44 AM

Originally Posted by mini2

Thanks but as I said above, this is ATT Yahoo POP email (thru my internet provider) and I only access it thru the MAIL program. The emails only went to a few of my contacts but nobody else would have those same contacts besides me.

You might only access it through your email client but there IS a web based version that can be used. So the issue described by other posters above is definitely the most likely point of entry.

Change your password ASAP, making it a secure as possible e.g. a combination of upper and lowercase letters, symbols and numbers

03-28-2012, 09:32 AM

Forgive me for my lack of knowledge in this area but I am still very confused.

To me, the biggest concern and mystery is how they got my contacts. My contacts are NOT available to any web based email version. They reside only on my mac and iphone to which I am the only user. So, did they hack into my mac? or my iPhone? I thought that wasnt a big concern with a mac and I have all the other security in place.

I would say my password was moderate at best and I immediately changed it and all the other security questions and info.

Thanks for your help

03-28-2012, 09:38 AM

Are you certain your contacts aren't synced with Yahoo online?

Try going to the online webmail and logging in to see if you can view your contacts

03-28-2012, 09:45 AM

I am positive that my contacts are only and have only ever been available on my mac and iphone. I never use the web based and never hooked it up. As soon as I became aware of this problem, I went online to my web based email and checked and confirmed that there is no access to my contacts.

So to me, it only makes sense that either someone got my contacts, which include a mix of people that nobody else has in common, off of my mac, my iphone or off of an email i sent out to a bcc group of my contacts after it arrived on someone else's PC.

??

03-28-2012, 09:52 AM

if you're certain neither your phone or mac are syncing conatcs to your email account . You'd have to have set this to No on the phone when setting up the account as it defaults to Yes.

Then if you did send a mass email to your contacts they could be accessed from your online sent items.

Just to be clear the mac mail, iphone mail and online mail versions are all pointing at the same ATT Yahoo mail server so will all have the same mail info available.

03-28-2012, 10:03 AM

I set up my email on my iPhone so that it does not include contacts. I have my contacts synced by iTunes with my mac, via cable and not iCloud or WiFi.

I also have my web based email set so that it does not and has never saved any emails other than the inbox - no SENT, Drafts, etc.

And yes, both my mac and iPhone are using the same ATT Yahoo mail server with the same email available.

Ive been as careful as I could be, knowing that I dont understand this stuff well and realizing that could make me vulnerable. I check and double check and Im pretty careful of not jumping into an area I know nothing about, like online stuff, without reading up on it and getting some direction from those who know more. My default for everything is save nothing, secure everything and use a mac because it is safer...