Who has the virus, Me or the other guy?

[ronmcse]

Hi,

   From time to time, I will receive an email from a friend, but the email is not really from them.  If I look at the actual sender email address it is some random email address I have never heard of.  and the email contents is of course a link wanting me to click it.  Of course, I never click the links and can always spot these emails quickly.  I've always heard people say "Tell the person who sent the email to you to go to their yahoo or gmail or some other mail account and change their password because their email has been compromised..... But I was thinking, is it really coming from the person I know, or is it coming from the actual random email address and just out of luck choosing a contact name in my address book as the sender?   

[David H. Lipman]

1.  Please do NOT assume "virus".  Most malware Today are trojans not viruses and the overarching concept of malicious software is "malware" not viruses.

 

2.  This does NOT have to stem from malware.  Your friend's email address could have been harvested and it is being used as the "From" or "reply to" address and can be easily spoofed.

 

3.  Your friend may be using a Webmail account and the account was compromised and thus spewing spam or "other" nefarious email.

 

4.  Your friend may have succumbed to Phishing and thus inadvertently provided his account credentials to malicious actors who then compromised his email account.

 

5.  The email provider may have been hacked and the email account's credentials were harvested and thus compromised and subsequently spewing spam or "other" nefarious email.

 

The above lists a few scenarios.  Based upon the limited information provided, a conclusion can't be drawn.  To narrow down the cause one must examine the full email headers.

[CWB]

yes , i agree with what DHL has mentioned .

you may have to post the email header(s) in order to find out exactly what is going on .

 

in addition , and this may sound a bit drastic ... however ... for the time being , i would not open any emails from your "friend" .

*protect yourself first*

inform your friend of what you suspect has happened and let him take the appropriate steps ... such as (say for example , a hotmail account ; reporting the compromised account to them) .

if your friend does not notify (in the above case) that their account has been compromised , they may find themselves unable to access the account as it has been "locked down" or hacked to the point of *someone* changing the password on the account .

[ronmcse]

Sorry for using the word Virus, the actual e-mail address that was sent to me is:  tldoss8214@muleriders.saumag.edu  which of course is not my friends email address, it only shows their name as the sender, not their email as the sender.

 

So from what I am understanding:  These emails does not mean I am infected with malware or a Trojan, but instead my Friend has been compromised in some way that this person tldoss8214@muleriders.saumag.edu is sending out an e-mail with my friends name??

[CWB]

yes , that is one possible answer/scenario .

in actuality , it may be that your friend knows *someone* at the address mentioned (arkansas university) that has their email account compromised and in turn that is how (perhaps eventually via social engineering) your friends account became compromised .

it sounds a bit convoluted but that is one way that these things happen .

to be sure , there are other ways that that one can find themselves on the receiving end of these type of things .

 

as for being "infected" (or not) ...

you may or may not be infected . it might be prudent to head over to the malware removal section and start a new topic .

it is better to be safe , rather than sorry .

start here and follow the instructions to the best of your abilities :

https://forums.malwarebytes.org/index.php?showtopic=9573

[David H. Lipman]

 

 

So from what I am understanding:  These emails does not mean I am infected with malware or a Trojan, but instead my Friend has been compromised in some way that this person tldoss8214<at>muleriders.saumag.edu is sending out an e-mail with my friends name??

 

Again... "...one must examine the full email headers."

 

At the most I am reading address spoofing.

[Firefox]

Address spoofing is the way of life these day.... heck I get emails from myself from time to time, but the actual email address that it came from is not mine....