Spyware Problem

Hi,

Recently I keep receiving messages in my email box which say I have sent out certain emails containing virus. Since I have never sent out those emails, I believe the username and the password of my email account have been obtained and abused by someone else, probably through some spyware.

The problem is, I do not know how they have managed to do so. I have installed several anti-spyware software. Moreover, I have changed my password and have since stopped typing in my password. However, my password is still being obtained by someone else despite all the effort.

Can you please tell me how to tackle this problem? Thank you.

It's more likely that your name is in the address book of someone who has been infected.
Can you check with your friends?

Clylbw, if it's any concillation, I get this thing all the time - like oatman says it's very likely to be because your name was in the address book of a user that was infected. Unfortunately there's nothing we can do to prevent it as far as I know.

Couple of things spring to mind.

Are the emails you are receiving telling you to stop sending out viruses from people whose address you have in your address book or contacts list?

If yes then you are probably infected and the virus is simply working its way through your address book trying to infect your contacts machines. Anti-spyware and good anti-virus protection will sort this out. You need both together, not one or the other. Try ad-aware (www.lavasoft.de) for spyware protection and Avast (www.avast.com) for a good free anti-virus program.

If no then it is probable that you are not infected but someone has used your email address in the 'From' field when sending out the infected emails. To find out if this is the case you really need a copy of one of the emails that has been sent (without the virus but with the headers). Analysis of the headers will show the path the email took to get to its destination. This is not conclusive as headers can be spoofed and there are anonymous remailers which allow the forwarding of email after stripping out the old headers or putting in new but false headers. The key thing here is that someone has probably picked your email address at random to use in the 'From' field. The simplest solution if this is the case is to change your email address as if it has been used in this way it will eventually be blacklisted on mail servers and you will have difficulty sending email.

HTH

Many thanks to all of you indeed.

Maybe I have not expressed myself clearly. I am getting receipt messages from other email accounts. According to the messages, I have sent out virus-infected emails from my account to other accounts. However, I have never done so. Thus I suspect someone else have obtained my password and used my account to send out virus-infected emails in my name.

Do you think the measures you have suggested still apply under such circumstances?

Thanks indeed.

If your firewall is running OK it will alert you if something is trying to get in or out.
Make sure your definitions are up to date. Also have you got SpywareBlaster and SpywareGuard http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/downloads.html
Also WinPatrol http://www.winpatrol.com/winpatrol.html
These should alert you if something tries to enter or alter sensitive parts of your system.
Run Spybot and Ad-aware as well.
If you're worried, run some of the online anti spyware and AV scans as well.
Let us know........

also who is your IP and have you contacted them?

Hi oatman,

Thanks indeed.

I have WinPatrol, Spybot and Ad-ware already, but this is still happening.

What puzzles me is, my password seems to have been leaked, but other sensitive information such as my credit card has not.

BTW, what does 'IP' refer to?

Internet Provider or Internet Service Provider
Did you run any online scans to make sure you're OK?
Are you running the latest version of Spybot? 1.3
http://www.safer-networking.org/index.php?page=download
It's got an addition called TeaTimer which does similar to WinPatrol by running real time.
I run them all without conflict. They're a pretty powerful bunch between them