Adobe upgrade email fraud - from Paypal data?

[markTHEblake]

This email is doing the rounds at present, purporting to be from Adobe but it is a scam. But as this email contains your first and last name, it appears convincing over the usual mass emails/dictionary attacks.

I beleive there is a link between these emails and Paypal, and i am not the only one. I have three Paypal accounts, and i received this email exactly once each to those related email addresses. Two of these addresses were set up uniquely just for the paypal logins and nobody but paypal/ebay would know these email addresses.

As the implication is either a security breach at Paypal or selling of data, just wondering what is other ozgolfers experience. Have you received this same email to exactly the address you have with Paypal?

from:    Adobe Incorporated <news@newman.cccampaigns.net>
reply-to:    Adobe Incorporated <news@adobe-new-downloads.com>
to:    (me at a personal email address)
date:    28 February 2011 12:29
subject:    Adobe Acrobat Reader latest version released ! Upgrade Available Now

Dear [FIRST NAME] [LAST NAME],

Adobe is pleased to announce that a new version of Acrobat PDF Reader was released today with new features, options and improvements.

http://www.adobe-new-downloads.com

What's new in this version :

* Read, search, and share PDF files.
* Convert to PDF.
* Export and edit PDF files
* Add rich media to PDF files
* Combine files from multiple applications
* Increase productivity and process consistency
* Streamline document reviews
* Collect data with fillable PDF forms
* Protect PDF files and content
* Comply with PDF and accessibility standards

To get more and upgrade to this version, go to  :

http://www.adobe-new-downloads.com

Start downloading the update right now and let us know what you think about it.

We're working on making Adobe Acrobat Reader better all the time !

Talk soon,

The people at Adobe       

Copyright © 2011 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All rights reserved.

[MegaWatty]

Received it on my non Paypal account that has become my SPAM account.

[mike]

I didn't get it.

[MegaWatty]

I'll forward it to you.

[mike]

Great.

[MegaWatty]

Nice sig!

It's missing an L.

[markTHEblake]

Received it on my non Paypal account that has become my SPAM account.

you sure you never associated that with Paypal (or ebay) perhaps as an alternate contact address?

[mike]

Nice sig!

It's missing an L.

It didn't last. Too big and loud.

Do you want it?

[MegaWatty]

you sure you never associated that with Paypal (or ebay) perhaps as an alternate contact address?

Maybe a long time ago. Can't remember.

It didn't last. Too big and loud.

Do you want it?

No thanks.

[mike]

What's with the Adams avatar a week out from the footy season, watty?

[MegaWatty]

Good question. Probably going to keep it though.

What the hell is yours?

[mike]

Have you seen Monty Python and the Holy Grail?

[MegaWatty]

Hmmmmm. Many many years ago I think. I'm guessing that's where it's from. Nice Photoshop job though.

[mike]

Back on topic, what's so sinister about that email?

[zeebee]

The spam emails are definitely using paypal addresses. There are many of us that have unique paypal emails that are getting spam with our real name.

See this thread for a lot more examples:

http://forums.overclockers.com.au/sh...d.php?t=942434

Some kind of compromise has happened at paypal and so far it seems to have gained little attention. Spread the word.

[Courty]

I received the same email to the address my Paypal account is registered to. I thought it very suspicious that it had my name on it, but sent it to the Spam box anyhow.

[Minor_Threat]

I have also received this email and it is on my Paypal email.

[Daves]

I see lots of Paypal scam emails. I also got the Adobe one.

My son has just sold a car online. I think the first 5 email responses were all scams, and he got the scams via SMS as well. I belong to an old Google Groups private group that hadn't been active until recently for a couple of years. As soon as it was restarted, I started getting scam emails galore.

[crai]

Back on topic, what's so sinister about that email?

The email itself seems to be a standard phishing email that most people would know to ignore.

What jumped out about this one for me was that it came to an account that I created on my domain solely for logging into paypal. And it used my full name as supplied to paypal. The email account is not advertised anywhere and is only used when I log into paypal. It's also in a format that is not easy for spambots to generate. My full name is something that I also don't advertise in public areas of the internet.

So the sinister part is that either paypal has given my personal information to someone. Or they have allowed that information to leak, either through a security hack or just poor maintenance.

[zeebee]

Just to be clear - these spam emails are using our real names along with our email addresses - information that is not publicly available from the paypal site.

So paypal has been hacked or compromised in some way, and your personal information has been leaked.

At the very least you should be changing your password. Personally, I've just closed my accounts.

[Veefore]

I got the email on my paypal addy as well.