IMPORTANT TO AOL USERS!!! Big Fraud Scam Going Around!!

[loudsue]

I just had the WEIRDEST aol experience (of all my weird aol experiences)! I got an e-mail that said my AOL account would be closed by Dec 30th if I didn't correct my billing information. It said that "maybe" my credit card had expired, or I had recently changed my billing method. Then...it said to click on this link, and there I could correct my billing.

The link took me to a page that had ALL ( and I mean ALL ) AOL billing page links, and a billing form.

So....I called AOL billing to ask 'em :wtf: ? It turns out that it's a spam to get credit card & account information.

The thing is.... the e-mail comes from " [e-mail]", and it has their logos, and all their little icons and things EXACTLY like the AOL site. IOW, it's replicated AOL's official pages.

When I called AOL billing (888-265-8008), and after being on "hold" for 15 minutes, the dude told me that it is a SPAM that has been going around! I asked him why in the hell AOL hasn't sent out an e-mail to all of their customers, warning them that this thing is being sent, and that it is a scam of the highest order?! He said he'd suggest it to management! <Sure!!! Duh! >

I have just in the past couple of weeks ordered the equipment to change over to DSL, and I was only keeping AOL until I could get my NEW e-mail address, and dump my 8-year-old AOL account.

I'll be more than happy to be done with them!

[BlueEyedSon]

1. It's not spam, it's called "phishing". Anyway, dump AOL ASAP.

[Florida_Geek]

2. Sorry to inform you

but the same crimminals work Earthlink too. I have not had the problem with Verizon BUT then again, I use Apples MAC service for email.

[Egalitariat]

15. And every bank/financial institution as well****

nm

[Ian David]

3. It's called Phishing, and their own employees fall for it too

According to an article in the current issue of 2600, the single biggest security flaw at AOL is that their employees persists on mistaking phishing scams for internal emails. They give their administrative passwords to spammers.

Oops.

[Nothing Without Hope]

4. Thanks. I'm AOL user due largely to inertia

It's a good general rule to NEVER respond to an email asking for your "billing information" by giving it to them. There are lots of these scams around. If you use ebay, you'll get them from there too. Identity fraud is big business and it's a shivery experience to have the contact from a criminal show up right in your home computer screen.

I'm resisting the changeover to DSL for a while longer, but eventually I'll leave AOL behind too when I change over.

[loudsue]

8. That's really scary...ebay accounts, too, huh?

That is good to know, 'cause I was just about to set up an account on ebay!

I'm glad to know from the responses in this thread that even the AOL people fall for it! It was SO real looking. Yes, it is a shivery experience!!

:kick:

[Nothing Without Hope]

13. Ebay accounts are OK, just need to protect them

I have a very good -- in fact, perfect -- record on Ebay. So scammers want to steal my ebay ID as well as my credit card info. Then they could scam someone using my name and use the good reputation I have built to defraud.

Sometimes I get as many as 5 emails per week, purportedly from ebay sites that usually actually LOOK like ebay sites if you go to them. They will say something to get your ID and credit card info, asking you to enter it on this second Ebay look-alike site: "Billing problem" or "ID expiring" or even "Fraudulent Ebay account."

Basically, as both AOL and Ebay tell you, NEVER give credit card info asked for in an email. And they will NEVER ask for it that way.

Despite all the attempts, I have never had a problem with my Ebay account. If you have never used Ebay, I encourage you to do so. It's really great. If you want, you can PM me and I'll try to answer any particular questions you may have.

Choose an Ebay password that contains both letters and numbers, is not too short, and would be hard to guess. Ideally, you should change it every so often. Don't use your email address as your Ebay username - that may not even be an option any more, I don't know.

In over 100 purchases over several years, I have not yet been taken in by a dishonest seller, have met many nice people, and have gotten some great deals, including some things I couldn't have found anywhere else. Always check the history of the seller and be ready to ask them questions. And of course, use your common sense.

[ulTRAX]

5. CitiBank, PayPal, eBay....

just some other phishing scams.

[illflem]

6. Seems like is would be easy for AOL to track this scam down

Guess they don't give a crap.

You won't be done with the virus known as AOL till you get a new computer or wipe your hard drive clean. Parts of it will keep popping back up, impossible to remove by normal methods.

[miss_kitty]

7. I am leaving AOL on the 31st

They won't change your screen name, they are really conservative, and when I told 'em I was quitting, they offered to knock my bill from 14.95 per mo to 4.95 per mo. ASSHOLES! You mean I could have had the EXACT SAME SERVICE for $120 LESS PER YEAR??? Now THAT'S what I call great customer service.

I have a friend who uses mailworks.org combined with Mozilla Thunderbird. He finds it very useful and versatile.

Good luck with whatever service you end up using. I have had a highspeed connection (Comcast) for 8 months now, and it is worth every penny. Except the AOL part.

[CatholicEdHead]

9. Phished couple times this week

I have been phished a couple times this past week already. They are obvious as it comes from companies I have no money saved/invested in.

I do IP lookups/WHOIS searches for info. I was able to track one guy down to somewhere in Davis, CA. I looked up the Davis PD and forewarded them my searches and origional message. Hopefully they can follow up.

I wonder how many of these fraud servers are hacked of unwhitting people/companies due to all the worms/viruses/security holes. Probably quite a few.

[electric-eye]

10. Another AOL - appearing scam, by phone

I keep getting voice mails from Penny Johnson, "with Allied Interstate", who only says that there is an urgent business matter she must discuss with me, and that "due to the sensitive nature of this matter, no further information can be left, please call me at 1-866-xxx-xxxx."

So I googled Allied Interstate. Tons of fraud claims, saying this company called former AOL members and threatened to report them to the credit reporting agencies if they didn't pay AI this second for the money they still "owe" AOL. Its a big fraud, evidently.

I signed up for AOL recently when I bought a different computer. It was one of those first month free or something offers AOL sends me once a week it seems.. I only used it for a week or so, friggin' hated the onslaught of forced advertising and popups galore, and went back to my old ISP (which is what I'd planned to do all along). I called and cancelled service with AOL, hadn't exceeded any of the "free" access limits. It was done, over, thanks AOL, but no thanks.

Except now I'm getting calls from a pretend collection agency over what I'm sure is a debt that never existed. How did they get my number? AOL? But AOL has my banking info, they could just take what they say I owe. I've recieved no bill of any kind. Very weird.

btw, if you're doing dial up, try access4less.net - no forced ads, good speed and with the accellerator that really works, its really excellent for dial up. Especially with FIrefox. $8.95 for all of it.

[ShinerTX]

11. I keep getting personal emails from SunTrust Bank

They say that my account has been violated...the only problem is that I've never had an account with SunTrust Bank, and there is not even a SunTrust bank in my state. The emails take me to a link which wants me to update my personal info, including my social security number. Fishy, fishy...

[allalone]

16. I got hit by these people too

but via snail mail. I returned their "bill" with a not very polite answer. I haven't used aol for years. I don't know how they glommed on to me.
I've been phished a couple of times lately by citibank and paypal, neither of which I use.

[loudsue]

12. The longer I've had to think about this, the madder I'm getting about it!

Not just that there are so many slimey crooks in the world, but that our government, who is SUPPOSED to protect us from crooks, has been so busy having lunches with their lobbyist friends, that they haven't bothered to figure out how to write effective, pertinent laws for cybercrimes. And they SURE haven't bothered to protect our privacy in any form that matters....in fact, they seem to be condoning database name gathering for all their CORPORATE friends.

It's one thing to get a phone call from a scam artist....you can always hang up. It's quite another when some cyber monkey can attach little creepy things to your computer without your knowledge.

:kick::kick:

[HysteryDiagnosis]

14. If they KNOW THAT THERE IS EMAIL going around with THEIR

address on it.... and they don't DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT IMMEDIATELY, I would certainly think that they should be sent whatever illicit credit card charges appear on their patrons accounts. I mean, if they want to be that lax about it... and what the hell??

I hear they were getting the spam weeded out!! You would think that this is the FIRST spam that their filter should be catching, absolutely the first!!

Do I sound excited?? I'll calm down now.....

[idiosyncratic]

17. Phishing is insidious . . . as is AOL. LOL

I don't know why anyone spends so much for an ISP. My ISP costs less than half of what AOL charges and I have unlimited service.

I could even get 100 email addresses :silly: if I wanted that many.

:crazy:

[Shopaholic]

19. A very good rule of thumb--

don't ever click on a link that comes to you via e-mail. The site may look 100% official but often it's not. I can't tell you how many "official" update account info e-mails I've gotten from PayPal or Ebay that weren't. If you want to know if the info you've gotten in an e-mail is legit-type in the e-mail address to your bank or to Ebay or to PayPal yourself-and click on your account info, or call the customer service number to find out if everything checks out. Do NOT click on these links embedded in these phony e-mails!

[AngryOldDem]

18. This happened to me about a year ago.

Only mine involved a "violation" of Terms of Service. I was immediately suspcious because I knew I had not violated said TOS.

[sendero]

20. Fact is..

... if you are using AOL you are already being scammed.

You are paying $24 for what you can get for $10, plus you are being force-fed a lot of bullsh*it advertising and you are paying for it as well!

Friends don't let friends use AOL - for god's sake get a different ISP!

[Ian David]

21. AOL employees regularly steal and sell your information

There was an expose on this a while back, but it never got much MSM attention.

It happens every day-- AOL employees selling your information to spammers and scammers.

Finally, someone got so greedy that the MSM had no choice but to take notice. A couple of their employees got caught selling the information for millions of customers at a time.

That was too much for them to cover-up.

I just canceled my AOL account last month. I was only really using it for email and chat rooms.

And AOL sucks for both.

They utterly fail to provide a positive chat room experience for way too many reasons to get into here. But its mostly because of the out of control number of spambots spewing links into the rooms, and the abusive, nasty, disruptive jerkwads they allow to violate their terms of service at our expense.

[RebelOne]

22. I get scam e-mails like this at least twice a week.

Plus tons of Nigerian 419 scam letters.