Email issues December 2023.

[raygannon]

Anybody else having issues receiving emails? I have a blueyonder.co.uk address.

Sending works fine but I'm getting nothing back into my Thunderbird client or the Virgin Media email web portal not even when I reply to an email sent from my blueyonder email.

The fact I'm not even receiving emails into the web client suggests it's nothing I've done locally ;o)

Last email I had in on blueyonder was 9th December. I've checked spamhaus and can't see anything blocking there.

Appreciate any assistance!

Ray

[coenoby · Accepted solution]

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@raygannon wrote:

Appreciate any assistance!

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The first thing to check is to make sure that there is no auto forward set in your webmail account. Hackers have been known to do that to hide the fact they are using your email account for their own purposes.

In your webmail account click on the cog wheel symbol to access the settings, then on "Email" in the left hand menu.

Then  click on "Filter rules" from the list that opens up and see if anything has been set up. If there is a filter rule or an auto forward set up you should disable or delete it. If it is something that you did not set up yourself you must change your email account password to stop the hacker and also check any online accounts that are linked to your email address for any suspicious behaviour that could be linked to hacking.

Coenoby

[raygannon]

Thanks @coenoby. I did all that and a while later got a load of mail not delivered messages from postmaster, all very spammy looking, so could be my email had/has been compromised.

[coenoby]

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@raygannon wrote:

"Thanks @coenoby. I did all that"

So does that mean that there was an auto forward or filter rule that had been set up without your knowledge and you have now deleted it?  If there was a rule set up without your knowledge then your email account has definitely been compromised.

 "a while later got a load of mail not delivered messages from postmaster,"

The reason for all those non delivery messages is because the spammers sent 100's possibly 1000s of spam emails and a fair proportion of those were to email addresses that no longer exist or never existed.

The spam emails could have been sent using your email address and password but it could be that the spammers simply set your email address as the return address so that the non delivery messages all went to your email account not back to them.

Basically you need to assume that your account has been compromised and change your VM account password. That's not as easy as it used to be.

• Sign into the My Virgin Media Account for that email address by entering the email address and then the current password here https://www.virginmedia.com/my-virgin-media 
• Then go to Account Settings then Account details, scroll down to  Sign In details 
• Scroll down to and clikc on "edit" to the right of password.
• VM have recently changed the security on their email accounts so that you now have to specify a non VM email account to become the username for signing into your VM webmail account. Follow the instructions, verify the email account and you can then reset the password for the webmail account and My Virgin Media account. To access either of those you will need to use the non VM email address as the username and the new password you have just reset.
• A second change that VM have made is that you need to use a separate Mail app password in email apps such as Thunderbird.
• Go back to the Account settings  and scroll click down to the Virgin Media Mail section and click on Manage your Virgin Media Mail app password .
• Then scroll down to the bottom of that page and click on  Generate new App password and follow the instructions.
• A new secure password will be generated for you. Your app password needs to be used for all apps accessing your Virgin Media mail address. Therefore you’ll need to update the settings in Thunderbird with the new password.
• Remember that this password is separate from your sign in details for My Virgin Media (or any Virgin Media apps). So, if you need to check your Virgin Media Mail emails through the VM website you’ll still use your My Virgin Media password.

  Sorry that ll seems complicated but that's how VM email is these days. The good thing is that once you have successfully followed those steps your VM email account should be much more secure.

Oh and by the way, you also need to check all your online accounts, such as Amazon, Facebook etc that are linked to your VM email account. The spammers / scammers may also have accessed those as well.

Coenoby

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[raygannon]

Apologies, not au fait with correct reply formatting...

"So does that mean that there was an auto forward or filter rule that had been set up without your knowledge and you have now deleted it?"

The auto forward had an unrecognised email address in it, but was greyed out with the auto forward apparently disabled. Bit of a smoking gun that.. Have deleted that entry and taken out all custom rules.

2FA set up from a separate email and hopefully all good and clean now.

Thanks again for taking the time to help

Ray

[Robbie34]

My email is down this morning.

[coenoby]

@raygannon 

Glad to hear that it's a sorted, thanks for the update.

Coenoby