Is This Email Legit?

I received this Email today.
Looks legit
Opinions.



Dear Optus Subscriber,
========================

This message is from the Optus Broadband E-Mail Information Technology service messaging center, to all our subscribers, account user's. Meanwhile all account users systems will under go regularly scheduled maintenance. Access to your mailbox via our mailportal will be unavailable for some period of time during this maintenance period. We shall be carrying out service maintenance on our database and e-mail account center for better online services.

We are deleting all unused webmail accounts to create more space for new accounts In order to ensure you do not experience service interruptions/possible deactivation Please you are advise to reply to this email immediately confirming your email account details below for confirmation/identification.

1. Optus Username:
2. Optus Password:
3. Date Of Birth:

Failure to do this will immediately render your Web-email address deactivated from our database.
Thanks for using Optus.

Optus Account.
Copyright ©2011

 

Meanwhile what? Oh and undergo is one word.

Is illiteracy a requirement to work for them?

Puleeze!!! "render your email address deactivated...."

Definitely worth copyrighting

 

Turns out it is SPAM.

Optus already have my account details.
Email Account details harvester.
How many would panic and just fill in the details and return?
They are getting real clever.
Just found another Spam give away after I posted the Thread.
I just clicked on the return Email Address.
The return Email address is a Hotmail Account and not Optus.
Allheart55 and BeeCeeBee your hunches were Spot On. (again)

 

I just went to my Outlook Address book and found this Email Address in my Address book without my consent.
Traced the Hotmail account to Redmond WA.

 

We have to be vigilant and question things like this. Well done Doug.

 

As Barry pointed out - the grammar in these phishing emails is nearly always a give-away.

They sound so plausable.
I have had some recently from "my bank".
I copied the email properties and sent them to the bank's security team.
I got one thank-you for the first one and then nothing.

I don't know what it is like in Australia / USA but our banks here in UK have gone over the top on security measures.

I tried to open an account 3 weeks ago. I STILL have not completed the security proceedures to access my account.
We now have portable key pads in some banks that generate a code that is requested every time you try to access your account on line.

Fraud must be massive if they have to put these measures in place.

(Slighlty off topic )

 

Online fraud is escalating, as is shown by the masses of these sort of E Mails, they wouldn't send them if it didn't work for them, so they must be working well.
Every time any sort of query turns up in any forum regarding scam mails I always try to answer in the hope that more will read my answer and become the more wiser.
My main answer is always think twice, and double check with the organisation supposedly involved, when you see anything asking for personal details of any nature.
Never ever just fill them in and send, pick up the phone and ring the bank, the building society or FedEx or whoever the mail is supposedly from.
In 99% percent of these cases you usually find the E Mail is a scam and has most certainly not come from the supposed authority.
Oh, as an edit to add,
There is now a police maintained base to forward these things on to in the UK.
The address is on this site here=

http://www.actionfraud.org.uk/help-disrupt-fraudsters-by-reporting-scam-emails-feb11

Even if you are not in the UK, considering a lot of the scams and scammers aren't either you can still send your scam mails, they get put out to the international crime fighting community.
Nev.

 

Ironic that the area you tracked it to is Microsoft's headquarters

But really have to agree some of them are getting smarter with spam emails, I haven't had any personally with that sort of tactic (do get some though that are moved straight to Spam) but my Mum has had some banking emails from two banks she isn't with asking for details and threatening things like closure of account etc which she deleted straight away, she would probably be classed as a novice/some experience user so not exactly the best of computer users, but I think it is more about recognising the flaws in these emails like spelling and grammatical errors, although it would take some computer knowledge to recognise that the password request via email is fishy.

Additionally a site called SpamCop is a good place to report these spam emails as they get passed on to the host etworks/ISP's where they originated, which has worked for me quite well, I was only getting one or two every couple of days, now I only get a couple of spam emails a month now (when a spammer realises their emails are getting nowhere ).

http://www.spamcop.net/

 

I have an online account with RaboBank and they supply each customer with a little electronic generator. Quite a hoop to jump through to access the account and again if you want to withdraw anything. Good luck to anyone trying to sneak into this account, LOL.

 

The main thing that stood out for me apart from the punctuation and grammar
was this line:-
Failure to do this will immediately render your Web-email address deactivated from our database. NO company would ever state this, because if they did, what about all the people that are away/ dont have access to email all the time through smart devices. They would lose too many customers.

These things are getting more common, I personally have a nice little file that I send to them

 

I liked the Copyright Icon after Optus.
This one no doubt will cause many to panic and provide details without checking first.
More threatening than the usual UPS delivery waiting type Spam.
They also picked a good time to send, 5am Sunday Morning.
Optus head office is closed till Monday morning, by which time it's all over.

 

Well the golden rule is :- no one but you should ever know your password

even with access to the this forums inner workings I can't access other members passwords, I can change or reset them, but not view what they currently are.

so anyone or anything asking you for passwords of any type should be viewed as malicious

 

I may not have phrased that very well, I can get the forum software to generate a new password and email it to the associated email address,

So even then I wouldn't get to know a members password, as I cant change the email settings without logging into the members account.

 

I don't know about all e mail accounts, but in the Windows live and others I know of, when these mails provide a link to click on, which like this one=

www.bank of nowhere.com

Hover the mouse pointer over the link, which will also work in your browser unless turned off, in the bottom left corner the real URL should show, in this case this topic.
I got one today supposedly from Youtube, I have a Youtube account, so if not the wise bunny I am, I might just have clicked on the link, no doubt being lumbered with at least spam, but possibly worse.
The real link was certainly not to Youtube.

Nev.