I’ve received now a second email from an unknown source that masquerades as an official PayPal email. The idea of the sender is to get me to disclose my login details of my PayPal account, so that they can rob me, basically.

Usually my iCloud email puts these straight in the spam folder, but for whatever reasons iCloud doesn’t recognise these emails as spam.

The emails had the subject and allegedly came “from” :

1. “Your account has been limited until we hear from you” from “ser.vi.ce@intl.com”
2. “Notice : We’ve Account Limited Access” from “fahrianjeng@pepekkuda.onmicrosoft.com”

Is a fairly obvious sign that they aren’t genuine PayPal emails, as genuine ones would come from a “@paypal.com” address. I’m also not sure the wording of the second email’s subject makes sense, better English would surely be – “Notice : We’ve Limited Access To Your Account” or even just “Your Account Has Been Limited” as is mentioned in the body of the email … I know PayPal are greedy morons, but I think they tend to employ people who know grammar to write their emails for them.

Anyway, here’s the second email text :

Your Account Has Been Limited
Dear Customer,

Your PayPal account has been limited because we’ve noticed significant changes in your account activity. As your payment processor, we need to understand these changes better.

This account limitation will affect your ability to:

Send or receive money
Withdraw money

Also, you won’t be able to:

Remove any bank accounts
Remove credit cards
Close your account

What to do next

Please log in to your PayPal account and provide the requested information before Sept 5, 2015 through the Account Review. If we don’t receive the information before this deadline or we notice additional significant changes in your account activity, your account access may be further limited.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation. If you need further assistance, please click Contact at the bottom of any PayPal page.

Sincerely,
PayPal

And a screenprint thereof …

I’ve highlighted the suspicious aspects of the email which are :

1. The email address isn’t an @paypal.com address
2. When I “float over” the “View this email in your browser” button, the link is “http://127.0.0.1/*|ARCHIVE|*” – clearly not a paypal website !
3. The date that they say they need the requested information by has already passed !
4. When I “float over” the “Log in Here” button, the link is “mdk.to/0Ehb”, as opposed to the “@paypal.com” which I’d expect.
5. And lastly, I suspect PayPal would provide a “Contact Us” link in the email itself. I think it’s unlikely they ask someone to “please click Contact at the bottom of any PayPal page”.

So, just a warning if you receive this email, or similar … and also what to look for to spot fake emails from people who are attempting to steal from you versus GENUINE emails. Please do be careful – because someone could do you a lot of financial harm if they had access to your PayPal account, and I’m not sure PayPal would care about you, because at the end of the day it was you that disclosed your PayPal login credentials … So you might not be able to get the lost money back …

For those who’d like to know more about “Phishing” – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phishing

Lastly, it’s always best to navigate your own way to your PayPal or online banking, rather than follow a link in an email. And obviously don’t disclose your login and password unless you’re 100% sure about the site you’re trying to access.

Cheers

Don Charisma

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