Convincing Paypal Email

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Hello I'm New here! Joined: 29 Jun 2009 Posts: 2

Wasn't sure where to place this, but I feel I need to give a warning about this email as it very nearly caught me out. I'm glad I checked it out with Paypal first! Apologies if this is in the wrong area of the forum.

Unauthorized credit card use associated with this account.
Sunday, 19 July, 2009 1:37 AM
From:
"[email protected]" <[email protected]>
To:
undisclosed-recipients
Message contains attachments
Restore_your_account_PayPal.html (4KB)

Dear PayPal user,

As part of our security measures, we regularly screen activity in the PayPal system. We recently contacted you after noticing an issue on your account.

We requested information from you for the following reason:

We recently received a report of unauthorized credit card use associated with this account. As a precaution, we have limited access to your PayPal account in order to protect against future unauthorized transactions.

Case ID Number: PP-503-410-563

This is a reminder to restore your account as soon as possible.

Please download the form attached to this email and open it in a web browser. Once opened, you will be provided with steps to restore your account access. We appreciate your understanding as we work to ensure account safety.

In accordance with PayPal's User Agreement, your account access will remain limited until the issue has been resolved. Unfortunately, if access to your account remains limited for an extended period of time, it may result in further limitations or eventual account closure. We encourage you to restore your PayPal account as soon as possible to help avoid this.

We thank you for your prompt attention to this matter. Please understand that this is a security measure intended to help protect you and your account. We apologize for any inconvenience.

Sincerely,
PayPal Account Review Department

PayPal Email ID PP638

Of course after re-reading it I could plainly see the giveaways, but the initial shock and curiosity almost made me open the attachment. I still don't know what it contains, but at a guess I'd say some kind of a trojan. It has got to be the best presented scam email I have ever received.

Posted: Sun Jul 19, 2009 9:47 pm

I got the same email, and although I knew it was a scam (I've received many similar scam emails which were supposedly from banks and ebay), I opened the attachment out of curiosity. It basically just wanted all the information that I provided to paypal when I joined, like bank account information, etc. So I filled it out and sent it back! lol

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 29 Jun 2009 Posts: 2

barbidollar wrote:

So I filled it out and sent it back! lol

Hmm...that gives me an idea! Laughing

Hello I'm New here! Joined: 09 Sep 2008 Posts: 6

Mod edit, no need to quote the whole of the first post, we can see it above, use @username instead to direct your reply at a member, cheers - SP

I'm sure most everyone here knows this, but paypal will ALWAYS send communications from them with your name on it. Never with "paypal user".

Posted: Thu Aug 27, 2009 7:58 pm

I average one or two of these per month. Send it with full headers to:
[email protected]

Hellish Taskmaster Joined: 31 Dec 2008 Posts: 537

Use phishfighting.com to fight back. They send hundreds of fake entries to these things.