Random Question: Email Security

[dr.girlfriend]

Sorry, not really on-topic but hoping y'all might have some ideas.  It's clear that over the past few days someone is using my email to sign up for a bunch of random newsletters and things (e.g. HelloFresh, AARP newsletter, AllPosters, People Weekly, etc.).  Some of them are asking me to confirm, but otherwise I'm just getting a lot of junk mail.  It's definitely annoying and I'm unsubscribing to them as they come in, but there's nothing I should really be concerned about, right?  It's not like my actual email was hacked; no one is getting weird emails FROM me, and I have credit monitoring and nothing looks hinky on my real accounts.  Just trying to figure out if there's a motivation for this I can't think of or if I just got on some list of active emails that got sold -- or if I pissed off someone who had my email!

[mcsangel2]

I don't know, I'd be concerned that your email *was* hacked and the signing up for spam is a way of making sure your email is legit or something?

[babsbunny]

Recommend changing your email password if you haven't already. If it is a mistake, the person will eventually stop (assuming there is anything they really wanted access to). If intentional, I have no advice other than continue to monitor it. Good luck.

[just]

Sometimes if your email is compromised, the hacker will flood your inbox with crap like that so you miss emails that are a result of more intentional malfeasance. So if they’re trying to gain access to a bank account by trying to reset your password, they’ll get that email in your inbox, reset the password, delete all emails that indicate that issue but at the same time flood your inbox with spam so that you’re so busy dealing with that you miss any important emails that come in

Having said that they tend not to do it with legitimate companies like hello fresh etc because those take too long to sign up for.

Based on what you’ve said I think you’re fine, but - I’d take this as an opportunity to change my password, sign up for multi factor authentication if available and take a look through your inbox carefully - sent folders, deleted folders, all those

[shamrockshake]

Jul 16, 2021 22:19:07 GMT -5 just said:

Sometimes if your email is compromised, the hacker will flood your inbox with crap like that so you miss emails that are a result of more intentional malfeasance. So if they’re trying to gain access to a bank account by trying to reset your password, they’ll get that email in your inbox, reset the password, delete all emails that indicate that issue but at the same time flood your inbox with spam so that you’re so busy dealing with that you miss any important emails that come in

Having said that they tend not to do it with legitimate companies like hello fresh etc because those take too long to sign up for.

Based on what you’ve said I think you’re fine, but - I’d take this as an opportunity to change my password, sign up for multi factor authentication if available and take a look through your inbox carefully - sent folders, deleted folders, all those

Yes, this. I just went through it earlier this year. But I was flooded with THOUSANDS of emails in one day, mostly in languages other than English. At the same time I got a text alert from my bank so I assume it was related to the emails. I’m still dealing with residual emails from that 6 months later, trying to get myself off all of these lists. This sounds like someone accidentally using your email address

[spinnaker5]

Lurker chiming in with a longer-term suggestion: Create a separate email account that you use only for online shopping, newsletters and subscriptions etc. It keeps 99% of spam out of your personal inbox and, worst case scenario, if you do have a hacking issue and have to change email addresses, again your personal one won’t be affected. ETA of course you still have to ensure both addresses are secure - multi-factor authentication as a pp suggested is a good idea.

[magpie]

I had to abandon an email account long ago because many people were using it for spam/newsletters/signups for various sites/etc. I even had someone use it for their wedding registry once, which was REALLY stupid because I could have logged in and change the address/all the info if I wanted to! I was an early gmail adopter and it was a rather generic account (my first and middle name, both of which are fairly common). In this case, it was nothing nefarious, but it eventually became so annoying that I abandoned ship and now use it as my shopping/junk account.