# What is causing this email problem? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 6, 2010, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-causing-this-email-problem/559698 "2010-11-06T13:56:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2010, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-causing-this-email-problem/559698/1 "2010-11-06T13:56:11Z")
Recently, I was sent a strange email saying that it had failed to send them to people in my address book. No info in the emails, just a link to some weird blog (the address looked Russian-esque). I didn’t send them and I told everyone who did get one that anything from me without a title should be deleted. Is this an infection of some kind? And how do I fix it? Is there a free computer cleaner you’d suggest? ---
**Author:** ![Al\_Bundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e79b87/32.png) [@Al\_Bundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Al_Bundy)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2010, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-causing-this-email-problem/559698/2 "2010-11-06T15:26:40Z")
You need to provide more information about your email client and the header of the subject mail. I know for a fact that a large number of Yahoo addresses were compromised and people are sending email that appears to come from their accounts. All of their address book members receive the bad mail providing a link to a web site advertiser. I Googled and found that Hotmail addresses were also taken. Once your address and address book are out there, little can be done to prevent abuse except what you are doing in advising your friends except changing your mail address completely. These hijackers keep morphing their headers so filtering is difficult. ---
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2010, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-causing-this-email-problem/559698/3 "2010-11-06T19:44:59Z")
> [@Al\_Bundy](#): > > You need to provide more information about your email client and the header of the subject mail. > I know for a fact that a large number of Yahoo addresses were compromised and people are sending email that appears to come from their accounts. All of their address book members receive the bad mail providing a link to a web site advertiser. I Googled and found that Hotmail addresses were also taken. > Once your address and address book are out there, little can be done to prevent abuse except what you are doing in advising your friends except changing your mail address completely. These hijackers keep morphing their headers so filtering is difficult. I used Yahoo and there isn’t a header, just Re: and that’s it. ---
**Author:** ![Al\_Bundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e79b87/32.png) [@Al\_Bundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Al_Bundy)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2010, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-causing-this-email-problem/559698/4 "2010-11-06T22:00:12Z")
> [@Love\_Rhombus](#): > > I used Yahoo and there isn’t a header, just Re: and that’s it. Yes, mail has headers. Yahoo is mail. Yahoo has headers. Down in the lower right corner of the Yahoo client it says: FULL HEADERS You click on that and they will fill the screen. From there you can trace the IP numbers of the originating sender. You will probably see that your mail address appears there with an IP that is not yours or Yahoo’s. I receive these bogus emails myself from Yahoo email addresses. They are originating in Asia and Russia in my case. Use a service such as WhoIs to trace the IP addresses.