Got an email from your own email address? You've been spoofed

Have you received an email from your own email address? Have you been told that your computer or phone has been hacked, that compromising videos of you will be sent to your contacts, or that you’re a target of an assassination? Don’t panic; you’ve been a victim of email spoofing.

What is email spoofing?

Email spoofing is the act of changing or altering a sender’s email address. This can be used as an attempt to hide the actual sender’s identity, or it can be used to suggest that an email has been sent from someone with a lot of power, like your boss or your bank. It’s possible to change the individual name at the beginning of the email address, and the domain name at the end of the email address.

In these kinds of attacks, email spoofing is often used to suggest that a perpetrator has hacked into your email account. When the victim receives an email that looks like it has been sent from their own email address, this can help to ‘sell’ the story that the scammer has gained access to your systems. 

When you receive an email like this, the first step is not to panic. Scams like these prey on people’s anxieties; they’re designed to make a victim feel concerned and worried, because that means they’re less likely to think things through. If you haven’t already, don’t open the email.

As with all scam emails, do not click any links within the body of the email itself. When you don’t know the sender, any links within an email are potentially dangerous. Clicking a link in a scam email might mean that something is installed on your machine, or it might take you to a fake website where more information from you can be collected. 

This kind of email spoofing is very common. There are a few different versions of the scam that scammers seem to use on rotation, often with the same language and threats. If you have opened the email, the scammer is likely to be claiming that they installed malware on your machine and have videos of you accessing adult content, or they might claim to have been hired to assassinate you. Regardless, the request tends to be the same; send money to this Bitcoin account, fast.

Do not reply to the email, and do not send any money to the scammer. The claims in these kinds of scams are complete fabrications. The best thing you can do is send the email directly to junk.

Email spoofing is used frequently by scammers, as it’s a very easy way to make a recipient trust a sender. It’s cheap and simple, and it doesn’t require too much effort on the scammers’ end; just change a few details and send the email across. With a scam like this, it’s very unlikely that you have actually been hacked. In those cases, the scammer can do a lot more damage than sending you an email.

However, if you are concerned about your cybersecurity, Transcendit can help. Give us a call on 0191 482 0444, and we can talk through your options, scan your machine and ensure that your systems are secure.