[DelilahC]

Hi, sorry if this is in the wrong place, but since I have no idea what might be causing this, it'll have to do for now.

Recently I found out that one of my emails has been sending out spam that was being bounced back to me (via the mailer daemon) for years. Fortunately it's not one of my main emails, but it's still scary. I have no contacts, but I did use the address to send a few emails, and the recipients of those emails are the addresses that are being sent spam (I presume), and that are bouncing back. Then today I found out another email of mine has the same problem (though again, not a main one), so I'm even more confused.

I've changed all the passwords/secret answers, and have scanned with everything I have for viruses etc. Thing is, I always scan regularly and it never turns up much, and the emails have been bouncing back for years, and never to a new email address, so what could it be? I just want to know if it's my password (though I'd say they weren't easily guessable), or a spambot or whatever, before I go ahead and overhaul all my emails/passwords.

So to summarise:
* Mailer daemon has been bouncing back emails that were sent to addresses in my sent box
* The email contains a link at the bottom that presumably leads to a virus or dodgy site or whatever
* It's been happening for years despite frequent virus/adware/spyware scans that don't turn up anything (but I only became aware of it recently)
* I've changed all passwords/secret info, but would just like an explanation, and to know if I really need to be worried or not.
* I have the emails that bounced back, so I could copy and paste the contents, if it's necessary and safe for me to access the email again.

Please help! Thanks!

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Actually changing your password will usually solve this problem if you change it to a longer harder to guess password. We are seeing a lot of this with yahoo. Apparently it is very easy to use a password guesser program on yahoo so any password with fewer than 7 letters is easily guessed. They have now started offering a two stage logon which might help.

I went through several systems which had yahoo mail spam (including my wife's) and couldn't find any malware on the system. It was only after we changed the password to have 8 letters that the spam stopped.

You can try some free online scans if you like but I doubt they will find anything.

Use IE and go to http://eset.com/onlinescan and click on ESET online Scanner. Accept the terms then press Start (If you get a warning from your browser tell it you want to run it).

# Check Scan Archives
# Push the Start button.
# ESET will then download updates for itself, install itself, and begin scanning your computer. Please be patient as this can take some time.
# When the scan completes, push LIST OF THREATS FOUND
# Push EXPORT TO TEXT FILE , and save the file to your desktop using a unique name, such as ESETScan. Include the contents of this report in your next reply.
# Push the BACK button.
# Push Finish
# Once the scan is completed, you may close the window.
# Use Notepad to open the logfile located at C:\Program Files\EsetOnlineScanner\log.txt
# Copy and paste that log as a reply.


Let's also try the bitdefender quickscan.

http://quickscan.bitdefender.com/

When it finishes there is a View Report option at the bottom. Click on it and copy and paste the report (even if it says nothing found).




Ron

[RKinner]

Actually changing your password will usually solve this problem if you change it to a longer harder to guess password. We are seeing a lot of this with yahoo. Apparently it is very easy to use a password guesser program on yahoo so any password with fewer than 7 letters is easily guessed. They have now started offering a two stage logon which might help.

I went through several systems which had yahoo mail spam (including my wife's) and couldn't find any malware on the system. It was only after we changed the password to have 8 letters that the spam stopped.

You can try some free online scans if you like but I doubt they will find anything.

Use IE and go to http://eset.com/onlinescan and click on ESET online Scanner. Accept the terms then press Start (If you get a warning from your browser tell it you want to run it).

# Check Scan Archives
# Push the Start button.
# ESET will then download updates for itself, install itself, and begin scanning your computer. Please be patient as this can take some time.
# When the scan completes, push LIST OF THREATS FOUND
# Push EXPORT TO TEXT FILE , and save the file to your desktop using a unique name, such as ESETScan. Include the contents of this report in your next reply.
# Push the BACK button.
# Push Finish
# Once the scan is completed, you may close the window.
# Use Notepad to open the logfile located at C:\Program Files\EsetOnlineScanner\log.txt
# Copy and paste that log as a reply.


Let's also try the bitdefender quickscan.

http://quickscan.bitdefender.com/

When it finishes there is a View Report option at the bottom. Click on it and copy and paste the report (even if it says nothing found).




Ron