Is it likely that mail addresses are being harvested from Whats App users for spamming purposes?
I have just had a mail from my daughter with no message other than a link to what may be a wedding present site appended to her name!
I'm not brave enough to open it!
Their T&C state they won't ... of course that doesn't make it impossible, what makes you suspect WhatsApp out of the bunch?
"You hereby give your express consent to WhatsApp to access your contact list and/or address book for mobile phone numbers in order to provide and use the Service. We do not collect names, addresses or email addresses, just mobile phone numbers"
I have received a few messages that say they come from WhatsApp. When I have asked the "senders", they all say they have not sent anything, and have all had other people asking them the same thing. So it appears to be some address-harvesting device somewhere. I have no connection with, nor use, WhatsApp, I'm not even sure what it does or is.
In message , Davey writes
I have a problem with something called Topica, which seems to have associated my old email address (which I might have used years ago when I once subscribed to one of their old email forums) with a person by the name of Danielle.
I get multiple wonderful offers every day - even one offering subscription planning for 'our' funeral - which have rather dented my image of Danielle as being young and fit.
I suspect that some of these companies have broken databases rather than being deliberately evil.
Since I started using emails of the form:
tw_COMPANYNAME@mydomain, it's been interesting to see who the buggers are with the leaky databases. Adobe for one. Few online suppliers too. When challenged, one took it seriously and all said they did not knowingly sell my email address, so they or their platform probably have shitty security. Worth bearing in mind when you dole out credit card info!
Ditto (in my case mb-companyname@...), I've been doing that for many years now and highly recommend it. I use the filters at my ISP to black-hole addresses that have been leaked to spammers (currently 24 in number).
In some cases they're respectable companies and I suspect data theft by one of their employees.
Only one company has noticed their name in my address, and objected to it. That's lawyers for you.
Things seem to have changed a bit over the years. It used to be that once a spammer got an address, it would get continuous spam (presumably from lists being compiled and circulated). Nowadays if an address leaks I get one or two spams then nothing more. I don't know whether that is due to spammers now being promptly shut down, or due to today's spammers preferring "fresh" lists of addresses, or something else.
I do similar, but have given-up using that scheme to give my address to a real person, rather than a web form, they're convinced I'm giving them their own address, not mine ...
Assume that your address, and phone number, is always sold on in the same way as all charities sell on your details.
See if she's on Facebook. You might be in for a nice surprise!
In my case it was the Society of Authors, and that was just last week. The nice lady said she'd spoken to their Chief Exec and they were very worried about me 'using their name'. When I pointed out how it all worked, and that I only used that address when writing to them, they were very nice about it.
/In my case it was the Society of Authors, and that was just last week. The nice lady said she'd spoken to their Chief Exec and they were very worried about me 'using their name'. When I pointed out how it all worked, and that I only used that address when writing to them, they were very nice about it. /Q
"dragged kicking & screaming"....
Jim K
Are you sure that the message has got anything to do with Whats App?
I get lots of emails - purporting to come from people I know - which just contain a link to some (probably malicious) site or other. The person's name is shown as the "sender" but the domain of the sender address has been changed to something different.
I always put this down to the person's email account having been hacked, allowing some spam bot to send emails to everyone in their address book.
Could the one you received have been one of these?
A year or so ago, their was a rash of spam, pretending to be Whats App messages.
I've only been receiving it for the last few months, so it's still going on.
Exactly ONE company has apologised, and explained that their database was hacked and all the addresses stolen. All the rest tell me it's something at my end.
A couple of times I've put in official DPA complaints.
However, I'm still mystified by the spam that arrives to qox@ and goatqvcp@
Andy
In message , Davey writes
I've had these, I don't think they are from WhatsApp, I think they are spam, pretending to come from them.
No. Just what she suggested when I complained. I suppose the other names in the *to* list might have been instructive but I was anxious to get rid of it.
We have had a couple purporting to be from friends in some sort of distress and needing funds urgently.
Easily.
Sorry about the delay in responding but we have been away to the *land of the amber nectar* see up list:-)
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