On Independence Day I tried to log into my Facebook account and got a message that my password was incorrect. It was after my second attempt to log in, that I realized that someone hacked my account. Later, I found out that my e-mail was also hacked into. I find the scam stories that are sent out to my entire contacts list to be ridiculous. This particular story had me stranded in Wales. Everyone who knows me knows that I don't have enough money to go to Florida to visit my family there, much less Wales. I had a few replies and phone calls from family and friends to notify me that my e-mail had been hijacked. I would have found this funny, if the jerks hadn't also wiped out all of my sent history, my saved inbox e-mails and my contacts folder. So although I had to change my password on both accounts, I also have to rebuild my contacts folder. And since I keep a record of correspondence with my clients, that's gone too.
And what do the hackers have to show for it? A return e-mail from me telling them what jerks they are, because the return address was my name minus one of the "T"s. I'm pretty sure all of my friends and family are intelligent enough to know that the message wasn't from me. Especially since there were some really bad grammatical errors!
So, what have I learned from this experience? I need to write down my contacts information in an old fashioned address book, keep correspondence in a folder backed up on a thumb drive, and change my password more often on my Facebook and e-mail accounts.I've also heard that you should log off Facebook.
Sound like there's a lot of the scamming going around. Learn how to protect yourself.
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