# Did spammers take over my email

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-spammers-take-over-my-email/235581>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [March 21, 2004, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-spammers-take-over-my-email/235581 "2004-03-21T19:17:15Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\
**Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-spammers-take-over-my-email/235581/1 "2004-03-21T19:17:15Z")

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yesterday and today i got about 20 messages with the subject ‘returned mail: user unknown’ example

* * *

The original message was received at Sun, 21 Mar 2004 12:59:51 -0500 (EST)  
from [pool-151-196-138-112.balt.east.verizon.net](http://pool-151-196-138-112.balt.east.verizon.net) [151.196.138.112]  
\*\*\* ATTENTION \*\*\*

Your e-mail is being returned to you because there was a problem with its  
delivery. The address which was undeliverable is listed in the section  
labeled: “----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----”.

The reason your mail is being returned to you is listed in the section  
labeled: “----- Transcript of Session Follows -----”.

The line beginning with “\<\<\<” describes the specific reason your e-mail could  
not be delivered. The next line contains a second error message which is a  
general translation for other e-mail servers.

Please direct further questions regarding this message to your e-mail  
administrator.

–AOL Postmaster

----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----  
\<[grnty@aol.com](mailto:grnty@aol.com)\>

----- Transcript of session follows -----  
… while talking to [air-xi01.mail.aol.com](http://air-xi01.mail.aol.com).:  
\>\>\> RCPT To:\<[grnty@aol.com](mailto:grnty@aol.com)\>  
\<\<\< 550 MAILBOX NOT FOUND  
550 \<[grnty@aol.com](mailto:grnty@aol.com)\>… User unknown

* * *

They all came with attachments too, naturally i didnt open them but i dont know what this is or how to fix it. does anyone know? I think someone is using my email address to send spam, because i never sent any of these.

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**Author:** ![Shadez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/90ced4/32.png) [@Shadez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shadez)\
**Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-spammers-take-over-my-email/235581/2 "2004-03-21T19:23:17Z")

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I don’t know. But my .edu address sadly had the same problem yesterday, about 8 of em. And that was after being sent a virus a few days prior that was fortunately cleaned by the school admin before arriving to my mailbox.

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**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\
**Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-spammers-take-over-my-email/235581/3 "2004-03-21T19:40:16Z")

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No. This is the result of spammers or viruses spoofing mails with your address in the FROM field. They are not being sent using your email account or email client, however. They are being returned to you from bounced addresses because the email server looks at the FROM field when deciding where to send it back to.

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**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\
**Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-spammers-take-over-my-email/235581/4 "2004-03-21T19:44:33Z")

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> [@Q.E.D.](#):
>
> No. This is the result of spammers or viruses spoofing mails with your address in the FROM field. They are not being sent using your email account or email client, however. They are being returned to you from bounced addresses because the email server looks at the FROM field when deciding where to send it back to.

So there’s no way to get rid of them?

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**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\
**Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-spammers-take-over-my-email/235581/5 "2004-03-21T19:50:15Z")

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> [@Really Not All That Bright](#):
>
> So there’s no way to get rid of them?

Nope. Once they _have_ your email address, they can spoof headers all they want. About the best you can do is examine the headers of the bounced emails and see if you can identify where they were actually sent from and complain to the ISP that serves them. Even that probably won’t buy you anything, since it’s trivial to set up your own SMTP mailserver. You might email the folks on your address list, though, because chances are a virus or some other entity got your email address from one of their address books. Doing a virus scan yourself coudn’t hurt either, since you might be infected yourself.