Email with "FOR (MY NAME)" in subject line

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mom2otis
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Email with "FOR (MY NAME)" in subject line

Fri Aug 24, 2012 1:45 am

I hope someone can help. Recently, I have begun to receive emails that appear to be from people in my contact list. The first one came in my sister's name and had "FOR (MY NAME)" in the subject line. The email contained a link. I found the email odd for several reasons:
1. My sister's legal name was used, i.e., first name, maiden name, married name. The only place she uses this is on Facebook.
2. My first name is fairly common, but has a variant spelling (think Anne or Ayn rather than Ann).
3. The email was sent to my work account.
Since that first email, about two weeks ago, I've begun to notice more of these, from various contacts, in both my personal and work accounts. I have email accounts with Hotmail, Ymail, Yahoo and Gmail, plus my business address. Any thoughts on what has happened and where to begin troubleshooting? (The multiple accounts, by the way, are for organizational purposes. Hotmail is my primary account. Ymail is the junk account. Yahoo is tied to my day job. Gmail is related to a side business I have.)
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stan_qaz
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Location: Gilbert, Arizona
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Re: Email with "FOR (MY NAME)" in subject line

Fri Aug 24, 2012 1:59 am

Nothing unusual in that, spammers forge the return address all the time.

Fixing it isn't possible aside from finding every spammer out ther and pounding them with a hammer until they quit spamming. You can download a trial copy of MW from www.firetrust.com and try using that to filter out the forged messages. If you get the 2012 version there are some example filters in the sticky posts in the MW 2012 forum above. The free version won't work for you with multiple accounts so you will need the full version but that comes with a 30 day free trial.

http://forum.firetrust.com/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=5575
I am not a Firetrust employee just a MW user.
--
First rule of computer consulting: Sell a customer a Linux computer and you'll eat for a day,
sell a customer a Windows computer and you'll eat for a lifetime.
mom2otis
Rattled Rabbit
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Joined: Fri Aug 24, 2012 1:25 am

Re: Email with "FOR (MY NAME)" in subject line

Fri Aug 24, 2012 3:45 am

The unusual part is the subject line. Perhaps it's not unusual, but it's a new one for me, and I practically live in email.
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rusticdog
Firetrust Monkey
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Re: Email with "FOR (MY NAME)" in subject line

Fri Aug 24, 2012 1:42 pm

It wouldn't hurt to be sure relevant machines (yours and your sisters) are virus free as well. I had something similar occur when a machine got infected and was sending spam to people I knew. I picked up on it when I realised one of my accounts was spoofed to send spam to another of my email accounts.
mom2otis
Rattled Rabbit
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Joined: Fri Aug 24, 2012 1:25 am

Re: Email with "FOR (MY NAME)" in subject line

Sat Aug 25, 2012 2:00 am

Many thanks!
bravocharli
It begins with a single step
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Re: Email with "FOR (MY NAME)" in subject line

Sat Nov 30, 2013 10:05 pm

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