Forum Topic

Unwanted emails from McAfee

For four or five months I've been getting about five emails a day purporting to be from McAfee: "Warning. Alert. Your protection is about to expire. Renew now"I have never had McAfee and obviously my Norton is failing to protect me from this. I forward some to phishing@gov.uk and immediately delete them from the inbox and Trash.I wonder if anyone else has experienced this, or has any suggestions of how to stop it as it's driving me round the bend. I hesitate to click on "unsubscribe now" as I don't want any connection with the scammers.

Elizabeth Balsom ● 1557d18 Comments

Elizabeth.  There are lists of email addresses for sale on the dark web (and probably the on the ordinary web). It's interesting that you use BT email as at one time BT used Yahoo for their email services, and Yahoo had a major breach a while ago when criminals harvested a large number of email credentials. (BT started moving users from Yahoo to their own BT mail service in 2014 and as far as I knoiw no longer use Yahoo. The Yahoo breach was in 2013 but didn't come to light until 2016.
https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/news/yahoo-data-breach-ncsc-response ) Obviously, if you've only signed up with BT recently they must have acquired your email address from somewhere else ... Yahoo isn't the only source - there's been many other beaches: -( Several years ago a colleague and I discovered quite a number of our corporate email addresses on one of these lists. Our best guess as to how they got there was that when people were leaving the company and having leaving drinks they sent an email to a large number of people in the company but also copied it to the private addresses of a number of ex-colleagues, which were with companies like Yahoo that had been breached - the criminals probably just copied all the email addresses in the "to" and "cc' fields and added them to the lists they sell. Similarly, when Plusnet had a breach 20(?) years ago my private domain email address and address book were copied - before then I'd had no spam to my private domain (fortunately me my password wasn't stolen unlike the Yahoo compromise). And should anyone put an email address in the text of this (or any other) forum, which can be viewed by anyone on the internet, then there is likely to be software scanning the internet that can harvest it ...But it sounds like it would be good to attend one of Mark's drop in sessions, probably more hands on and useful than my theorising :-)

Michael Ixer ● 1545d

Hi Mark I use BT, so their spam filter doesn't seem very effective. I'm pretty much a computer novice and I gather now that Norton looks for viruses, not these irritating spam emails. About 5 or 6 a day, so it gets tiresome deleting the damn things. And I wonder, how do they get my email address? So many things I don't understand.I know from the Forum that you hold free tech drop in sessions, but unfortunately I'm not able to come this Saturday. Perhaps next time you're holding one I can join you.Thanks, Elizabeth

Elizabeth Balsom ● 1545d

Hi Elizabeth,First off, why do you think Norton should be protecting you from these spam emails? And can I ask if you are using Hotmail, Gmail or something else for your emails?The reason I ask is that Gmail's spam filter is way better than Hotmail's and Yahoo's ones, but only really comes into its own when using the web interface - ie it doesn't work as well if you use a mail app such as Mac Mail or Outlook or similar. I will be holding a free tech support drop in session this Saturday at Gail's in Lacy Road from 11am-1pm and I can show you how - and why this works.

Mark Phillips ● 1545d

I like little threads like this on this forum. Simon Sharp has no business trying to change that instead he should p**s off and find a forum more suited to his linear thinking.

Jenny Featherstone ● 1547d

Getting back to the original topic. If anyone has an answer to this it's the real way to make a fortune! Hotmail, Gmail and other email service providers have spam filters but I regularly have to  retrieve emails I want from the Junk folders while the unwanted spam gets through to my Inbox. It just seems to be a fact of life with email although a lot of solutions that partly work are sold to businesses.

Michael Ixer ● 1556d

Thank you, Barbara.The forum often has helpful tips and advice as I'm sure a lot of us know and value.

Elizabeth Balsom ● 1557d

Elizabeth, we all read what you put on here, If he doesn't want to read it he doesn't have to. Please keep putting what you want too. We won't read his and answer him.

Barbara Stevens ● 1557d

This forum is often a source of advice and sympathy about minor problems like mine with McAfee, particularly with computer issues.It seems that I have inadvertently deeply offended you. Please accept my profound apologies

Elizabeth Balsom ● 1557d

I'm not really out and about, and am actually an introvert and have struggled over lockdown too mentally. Apologies if comes across as mean but it's just spam in a forum where most are trying to learn or discuss Putney issues.Unfortunately there is no option to "mark as spam" on threads in the same way the original poster should to her McAfee emails.

Simon Sharp ● 1557d

Simon, if your bored at the start of the post don't bother reading the rest, simple as that. No need to be really nasty. If I'm not interested I don't read it. Perhaps some residents are lonely in lock down and just feel somebody is listening to them. Just because your out and about all the time. Some older people aren't.

Barbara Stevens ● 1557d

Haha! Of course I've been around here for years and hated for as many for speaking out against the archaic faded views and opinions of our delightful neighbours. This forum screams for a moderator. If this were Reddit, this post would be downvoted to oblivion. Unfortunately it's irritating when people have no initiative to Google things but to brain dump on a forum designed to talk of local issues. Can the original poster just take a moment to reflect on this?I've learnt so much about the local neighbourhood from 5% of the posts on here - events, history, places to visit. That explains the repeat visits, but you are right it does degrade ones sanity and patience.

Simon Sharp ● 1557d

@simon“Sorry not sure how any of this is a PUTNEY issue relevant to a Putney forum?”You’re new here, aren’t you? 80% of the posts in this dubious, un-policed forum are absolutely not Putney related in any specific sense. If only it were it not the case. When it is it usually turns into a personal slanging match when someone’s opinion is challenged. Post something local. Rattle the cages of the resident regulars why don’t you? Stir it up. So long as it doesn’t involve a conspiracy theory. 😂Or, take my advice, leave while you have your sanity 🥴

Freddie Francis ● 1557d

Sharp indeed. A person sometimes wants to reach out to neighbours about something that is bothering them, and why not?

Lisa Cottam ● 1557d

Sorry not sure how any of this is a PUTNEY issue relevant to a Putney forum?

Simon Sharp ● 1557d

Can't you click on the From address to access the option to Block Sender?

Lisa Cottam ● 1557d

I agree!  I also used to get McAffee notifications that annoyed me tremendously.Lately, I am getting emails on insurance (in the US) and Medicare????I have to conclude that somebody, somewhere, has been busy selling our data....  Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Ivonne Holliday ● 1557d

Thanks Simon. Glad I'm not alone. Sometimes the email address is Walgreens which I thought was a US drug store chain which at one point owned Boots. They may do still.So I guess I just keep deleting, but it's tiresome.

Elizabeth Balsom ● 1557d

Yes all the time. Takes one key depression to delete.Also get loads of emails telling me that my bitcoin account has been credited with £xyz amount. Again delete.

Simon Knight ● 1557d