Gunter

Very strange.

I had been in touch with agent325 (Carlo Ohanian) regarding Cup wheels he wants to sell.
After several e-mails and pictures, I was getting ready to find a way for purchase and shipping but then received a no-subject e-mail from Carlo that only contained a link.

No subject. Only a web address to click on. Expecting to see more pictures of the wheels I clicked on it.

My Anti-virus program successfully blocked a serious threat. I then noticed that it was also addressed to 50 other recipients.
I've sent an e-mail to Carlo asking why he would deliberately sent a link for a computer virus to 50 people?

His exact answer: Spam mail I got hacked.

ADDENDUM:

With many replies explaining "hacking" in defence of Carlo, I understand now that he was a victim and I shouldn't blame him; SORRY CARLO.

Sigh…………..I am glad so many of you know so much about computers and related issues. I envy you and wish I could understand more. When I studied for ME way, way back, we worked with Slide Rulers and IBM just came out with slotted data cards. Computers were mechanical with limited functions.

Dial-up: The area where I live has no cable reception, no high-speed internet connection and Cell phones don’t work here. It’s a trade-off for living in the country.

Never received actual tainted e-mails and understand not to open unknown attachments. But, the e-mail from Carlo was no attachment, it was a website. Since I expected more pictures from Carlo, I clicked on it believing it might be something like Photo Bucket. Anti-virus warning came up and I got scared and angry because I thought Carlo was mad at me for wanting more pictures.
It appears now that Carlo was a victim of some malicious action which I don’t understand. It’s not possible to delete the thread by me but I can add this explanation.
As many have pointed out, Carlo is innocent and I am sorry about the whole mess and hope that he can fix the problem in his computer.

Mark in Baltimore

Ummm, as Carlo stated, maybe someone hacked his account?? Maybe Carlo is not responsible for something so "disgusting"??

Just a thought...

DC from Cape Cod

It is obvious that he did not do it - the virus that infected his computer did it. His reply to you assumed you had some minimal amount of computer knowledge.

Gunter

I wonder how many of the 50 people with less protection opened the link and now have computer problems.

tanger

Emails get hacked without the owners knowledge all the time unfortunately. My wife's GMail account was hacked and she sent around a link to buy Viagra LOL

Chuck W.

I have heard of this happening. I wouldn't blame Carlos. In all likelihood, he was a victim too.

Warpig

I wouldn't be upset with Carlo at all. He most likely had no clue he sent this link to anyone, much less 50 people. If you are using Windows this is the reason it is imperative that you keep your machine patched with ALL of Microsoft's security updates for your Operating system, and to have a good anti-virus/malware program installed and patched to it's latest versions as well.

P-daddy

Same here my old hotmail got hacked and next thing you know, I was also selling Viagra to all the people on my contact list.

tigerrat

Yeah, he wasn't just hacked, hie email account was hijacked. Ken

Gunter

I hope he didn't do it on purpose but I've been burned before and scared of computers and all the bad stuff that's going around.

TMc993

With malware, the program takes over a computer without the owner's knowledge and distributes viruses via email accounts accessed with the computer. Without a rigorous and regulraly updated antivirus/malware program, it's not a matter so much of if but when it will happen. Here's a report from mid-year 2010: http://www.sophos.com/security/topic...l-threats.html

Mark in Baltimore

We're trying to tell you that he didn't do it on purpose. agent325 has been a respected member here for a long time.

mongrelcat

+1

Read this story of Rustock, a single entity responsible for 1M infected PCs sending billions of SPAM emails per day.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10805_3-20044480-75.html

Here's a sort of master list of security tools and stuffs (daunting) --
http://www.techsupportalert.com/cont...list-world.htm

To keep it simple I'd recommend Microsoft Security Essentials;
http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/

and Comodo Firewall + A/V;
http://personalfirewall.comodo.com/free-download.html

Just my $.02, hope it helps.

Raleigh993

Same thing happened to my wife this week. Apparently it's not hard to do.

Gunter

I know nothing about computers and in fear of anything that might go wrong with it.
Being nearly 70 doesn't help.
After a number of normal regular e-mails from Carlo, I expected that his last one was a link to pix for the wheels and was surprised when my Anti Virus program blocked it with a warning.
Only then did I notice that his e-mail was cc-d to 50 others.
Hope to hear an explanation from Carlo.