Hacked email

[ggulliver]

It seems my email has been hacked/compromised, and addresses to which I've previously sent mail are now receiving spam from me.

The account I use is at 1&1, with IMAP set-up on my iMac/iPad and also accessed through webmail.

I have Thunderbird and my 1&1 webmail accounts set to not collect addresses, and the address books have just a handful of entries... and don't contain many of the addresses sent to (many of which are one-offs of mine, used by me for membership of various sites).

I've obviously now changed the password, but would like to be more aware of whether the weakness is my iMac/iPad, the webmail, or a breach if the host system.

 

[Queen6]

My money would be in the iPad if you have used it outside on open networks, or the webmail on another device again on an open network. For the Mac you can download Malwarebytes for Mac this should find and remove any common Adware/Malware.

OS X is relatively secure, you would need to install an application and enter the Admin password. Scanning with Malwarebytes certainly won't hurt equally it may not reveal determined intrusion, that requires a deeper knowledge of the system and more sophisticated software. Personally I doubt the iMac is the source.

Q-6

 

[ggulliver]

My money would be in the iPad if you have used it outside on open networks, or the webmail on another device again on an open network. For the Mac you can download Malwarebytes for Mac this should find and remove any common Adware/Malware.

OS X is relatively secure, you would need to install an application and enter the Admin password. Scanning with Malwarebytes certainly won't hurt equally it may not reveal determined intrusion, that requires a deeper knowledge of the system and more sophisticated software. Personally I doubt the iMac is the source.
Q-6

Thanks.

After the initial 'OMG! WTF?' panic I've thought more about this and suspect Thunderbird isn't the issue.

I scanned the iMac before posting - seems clean.

I don't have the knowledge to know how insecure the iPad might be, but I guess it's relatively simple to find the webmail url and then gain access through password-guessing (which I've now changed).

 

[Queen6]

Thanks.

After the initial 'OMG! WTF?' panic I've thought more about this and suspect Thunderbird isn't the issue.

I scanned the iMac before posting - seems clean.

I don't have the knowledge to know how insecure the iPad might be, but I guess it's relatively simple to find the webmail url and then gain access through password-guessing (which I've now changed).

Possibly if the password is not complex, equally open networks are easy targets, it`s far better to ensure all traffic is encrypted, VPN etc.

Q-6