Forum Discussion

MilesP's avatar
MilesP
Up to speed
11 months ago
Solved

Keep getting dodgy emails from something@something.fathom-labs.io

I get daily emails from this website (specific details changed, but always with fathom-labs.io as the source). This is on Outlook. They are clearly spam as they claim to be from John Lewis or Boots or some other firm saying I have won something.

I always send them to trash or delete. 

The strange thing is that when I go onto Virgin Media Webmail, I can never find them in the Inbox or any other folder. All other emails are on the Webmail server. Are they somehow being made invisible to Virgin Media Webmail yet still getting through to my Outlook account (and on the iPad). Or is Virgin Media detecting them as Spam and deleting - but they aren't in the Webmail folder either?

 

  • MilesP  Yes, you are correct about Pop3.  It is all a bit of a mystery because if VM Mail was identifying them as Spam they would be put in the Spam folder and would never be downloaded to Outlook when using POP3.

    Are you absolutely sure that they are being sent to your VM email address and not to another email address that you have set up in Outlook (if any).

  • Graham_A's avatar
    Graham_A
    Very Insightful Person

    If you are permanently deleting them in Outlook then they won't appear in the VM webmail trash folder. 

    • MilesP's avatar
      MilesP
      Up to speed

      Thanks for the reply, but I checked the VM Webmail  Before I deleted it in Outlook. Also, my Outlook is set to use Pop3, which I don't think does delete them from the VM Webmail.

      However, I also use an iPad, which is set to IMAP that does delete mail from the Server. But in this case, I did not log on to the iPad until after this message was received and it is still in the iPad inbox, undeleted!

      So, how did it get deleted from the VM Server?

      • Graham_A's avatar
        Graham_A
        Very Insightful Person

        MilesP  Yes, you are correct about Pop3.  It is all a bit of a mystery because if VM Mail was identifying them as Spam they would be put in the Spam folder and would never be downloaded to Outlook when using POP3.

        Are you absolutely sure that they are being sent to your VM email address and not to another email address that you have set up in Outlook (if any).

  • Just had a look at my email settings on Virgin Media Website. I have my main account and 4 others. They all have a warning by them saying "The entered credential or authentication information does not work or are no longer accepted by provider. Please change them." If I try to change them, the only option is IMAP. I use Pop3.

    There does not seem to be any problem with these email addresses as I can still send and receive emails on them.

    This probably has nothing at all to do with the issue in this thread, and I am not changing my email settings as they all work now. Maybe Virgin Media no longer allows POP3 to be used for new customers. I suspect VW may be trying to get out of the email business altogether!

    • Graham_A's avatar
      Graham_A
      Very Insightful Person

      I agree that you may be correct in your final comment.  Indeed VM email accounts have not been available for new VM customers since May 2022.

      As regards viewing secondary email accounts in the primary VM webmail view IMAP has always been the only option.

      Have you tried logging into the individual secondary accounts via webmail at https://mail.virginmedia.com/

      You will need to log out of the primary account first or use a different browser.

       

       

      • MilesP's avatar
        MilesP
        Up to speed

        Finally got there and this has been a somewhat useful experience. I followed the instructions for editing all the secondary accounts and the default settings all seemed to work (although for some reason there was a warning about the passwords - may not have been quite long enough). Anyway, I can now see all messages from all my accounts in the VM Webmail sub-folders and the warning triangles have gone - phew. I can still received messages on Outlook and iPad.

        Also, now I can see the dodgy emails in my wife's sub-folder. I blocked the domain, but every few days they change the domain name slightly. Maybe I can figure a way to block anything with fathom-labs in ti.

        Progress though and thanks for your help.

  • Likewise I am getting daily emails from fathom-labs. Being non technical, I've got them automatically going into the Thunderbird junk folder - the slight change in domain name doesn't seem to affect it. I delete them en bloc from there, so don't even have to look at the wretched things. Not a very good solution, but for me, better than nothing, because I'm not going to click on the Unsubscribe button !   

  • renegadek's avatar
    renegadek
    On our wavelength

    I keep getting these and not too savvy on how to stop them ! very frustrating , getting them to my @ntlworld email 

    • Martin_N's avatar
      Martin_N
      Forum Team

      Hi renegadek,

      Thank you for your post. We're sorry to hear about the issue you've had with getting those emails. 

      Have you forwarded the emails to report@phishing.gov.uk

      ^Martin

      • SlySven's avatar
        SlySven
        Dialled in

        I've been getting these too on my main VM EMail account for the last couple of weeks - I only use Thunderbird (or the fork Epyrus) and looking at the source/headers I can't see any evidence they have yet been detected as spam by any of the intermediaries. I've been forwarded them to report@phishing.gov.uk religiously. I have noticed that the main "Go on, click me, you fool!" URL embedded in them now seems to be of the form: https://lots-of-dots-and=numbers.mlbtlr.com but as that is something to do with Amazon it is probably not helpful to completely block it.

        As for POP3 vs IMAP usage - I always understood that the former tends to download the message from the Server to the particular application that is viewing it - thereby removing it from anything else (or maybe that is something that is a setting) as such the ISP mail server just holds on to it until you can retrieve it - whereas IMAP is better suited to those who use multiple machines/OSes as the mail stays on the server for all mail applications (including web-based ones) to access - at least until one of them deletes them.

  • I've been getting these emails, visible both on my device and among my emails on the VM website, for about three weeks. obviously phising. I forward them to report@phishing.gov.uk, then block the source address, though this hasn't helped so far. 

  • ALF28's avatar
    ALF28
    Super solver

    I had 39 spam emails  from fathom labs back in march and april, non were tagged as spam by VM.

    Recent had 4 emails and some are  still from the same source and are postcode lottery, peoples postcode  lottery, advent calendars etc.

    The sender email address has changed but links in the email are sometimes fathom labs and get past the spam filters.

    Spam Gambling emails are always a problem usually lottery or casino, but the "postcode lottery" spam emails only  started on 26/12/2024

    • Seagull79's avatar
      Seagull79
      Dialled in

      VM seem to have given up with proper SPAM management as so much comes through that any decent SPAM filter should pick up.  

      • ALF28's avatar
        ALF28
        Super solver

        The spammers often use a legitimate server to send the spam email, which could be for example Amazon IP address or outlook IP address and not picked up as spam.

        However the sender emails address may be spoofed to hide the true identity of the sender.

        The spammer may be after bank details. 

        I have had several fake emails pretending to be Boots offering free gifts,the trick is they will ask for postage to get your bank details, these scam s are well known and easy to spot. One trick they do is to replace the letter "o" with a zero "0", perhaps to evade spam filters.

        Some of the company names  mentioned  in the email body  are dubious and can be company names that closed but they still use the name, easily checked by looking them up at companies house web site.

        It is misleading to get an email from a company that is legitimate high street company, but on closer inspection of the email sender address it is spoofed and not from the company, but these often get past the spam filters even though the email address is not correct for the company. The spammers are clever and know how to get past spam filters, so best to assume any email could be fake and not click on any links or downloads unless the email is proved genuine by checking the header and IP address and hosted server  of the sender, and if it is not recognised be careful.