Virgin.net email hacked.

[ALF28]

There should be an option to remove a primary VM email, I tried 3 times and was refused each time, if it is a primary email it is not possible to remove it for some reason, yet other email services do allow removal?

My VM email has been a target of hacking, phising, blackmail etc since 2016 but I have no way to remove it even though I now log into VM account using an outlook.com email.

As VM are phasing out email, there should be an option to rmove an old primary VM email and replace with a third party email as I have done but still can not delete out a problem primary email  managed by VM.

I have had recently in the last few weeks had a blackmail email to my ntlworld.com  email wanting a bitcoin payment within 48 hours usually which I ignored, saying they had access to my webcam, and a trojan installed, all a complete lie, and  just wanting a payment, it originated from malaysia.

My wife also has had a similar email sent from her own email, this is a trick to look as if they have access to the email but is just spoofed.

To be on the safe side, change passwords when this happens.

At the same time I also started getting regular emails with pictures and videos links from a  specific named sender name  which I ignore, which may be linked to previous hacking activity of linkedin

Some other emails have had hacking attempts as well as social media hacking attempts

 The hacker/spammer/blackmailer has obtained  my  information  dating back years and  using that for illegal activity linked to my VM account over a period of years and also targets other accounts such as facebook, linkedin and outlook.com email which have been linked. 

I now use 2FA on most accounts andchange passwords often and have managed to remain secure.

The hacker will also try to access other accounts using the emails connected to VM, and force  password changes.by security which I have had, It is perhaps best to have many emails and use different ones for different purposes.

It is wise to change a corrupted email to a new one as I have done and stop using the VM email if it is getting blackmail and other weird unknown emails from unknown senders who hide their identity.

Perhaps VM should consider  providing an option to delete a primaty VM email  for both existing and previous customers and then change to a third party email,or is that too complex?

If an email  is compromised, then keeping it is a security nightmare, so best to ditch it as hackers may be using it for illegal purposes.All emails not just virgin can be a target for hackers and cyber crime but most do allow a facilty to delete out a problem email address or use alias addresses which can help.

I would be interested to know the reason VM insist on keeping a corrupted/pwned primary VM email address with no facilty for removal, putting customers at risk, it is so easy to switch email to another provider so I did that to avoid using a heavliy spammed VM email address.

[Sabrina_B]

Hi @ALF28 👋.

Thanks for reaching out to us. Apologies you have had issues with your email address being compromised. We can assist you, we would need to bring you in for a private message to get everything in motion. Please look out for the envelope on the top right of your web browser or if you are using a mobile device, it will be located under your profile icon.
 

Thanks.
 

Sabrina

[ALF28]

Thanks for your reply.

This post was moved, so was actually a reply in another thread, not a new post.

I could not see any envelope for a private message but do not need one.

I was just making the point that  my outlook.com login email should be my primary email, not the old legacy ntlworld.com email which is 20 years old now.  (new customers no longer have a VM email address)

My old VM ntlworld.comemail is not compromised and is secure, I just get a lot of junk/scam dangerous emails and do not use this email much, as you can see from my comments the scammers  do target my VM ntlworld.com email

My own checks may have indicated the source(s) of such emails when I researched the senders but difficult to proove, It may be a known to me  person(s), and just best ignored.

I am now more secure as I log in to VM using an outlook,com email address which is also my contact address for VM, but on occasion VM have  sent  messages to my primary ntlworld address.

[soong-]

This should be a warning to everyone not to use their primary address for anything else other than VM login and use a very secure password and never save it in a browser as a hack can capture this and log in.

I have never seen an option for 2FA on VM email. An easy secure and private alternative unlike gmail who suck up your data is Protonmail,who even on a free address give a 2FA option. The best being your own mail server of course.

I have been battling for 10 years to get secondary VM email accounts reinstated. I have lost  on not being able to access other sites that I used the email for a login and the only way of logging in is using the email address because it sends a 2FA code which now goes to a dead VM email address..I only needed it reinstated to change it to something else.

This with Virgin's semi stealth forced upgrades in speed then increasing the monthly bill later which now is £79 for the 1Gb package I have to leave after 23 years. It was Blueyonder when I fist had it, Strange how they keep the primary Blueyonder email address working all this time but the virgin.net and virginmedia,con just get deleted or disabled.

I now can get another provider 900Mbs both up and down (VM 1GB down 50Mb up)

Bye Virgin

[Ayisha_B]

Thanks for the update @ALF28 

If you do require further support then please respond to my colleagues PM so they can discuss things further. 

Best wishes

[ALF28]

Eventually VM may decide to ditch the old legacy emails but until they do, and as  I no longer use the ntlworld.com email still attached to my VM account, I have set the VM email filters to discard most of the spam emails which are a security risk, and now use other email provider outlook.com to log into VM which has 2FA  via text, not yet provided in VM email options although VM does provide email verification for password changes etc which is a good security feature.  I appreciate many users still do use VM email so it is retained at present.

My VM ntlworld.com email is now just used for a few newsletters which I still receive so remains active for now, but not used any more as a main email as it gets far to much spam email due to previous breaches on sites such as linkedin and facebook, and I no longer use my VM email for other accounts having switched to other email providers  where the email is not pwned.

[ALF28]

update-pwned email

As the primary email can not be removed by VM for unknown reasons, even if listed on the have I been pwned website, my ntlworld.com email has 10 data breaches listed which is a lot, I have found a solution that blocks all spammers and scammers.  The solution is to use email filters to direct any genuine emails to folders, and then use filters to discard all other emails. As the scam emails such as blackmail, and unknown photographs been sent via email which is illegal activity, i have now blocked all such emails using discard in email filters.

This action is drastic to block all unknown emails but needed to prevent such illegal activity.

The action taken followed on from a similar issue with another email provider, but I was able to delete the email and replace it with another address, the email address was  pwned and receiving blackmail email and banking scams and was able to be removed.

The conclusion is that any email listed on the have I been pwned website will attract attention from hackers, spammers, fraudsters etc.

Virgin do not offer any help in such cases, I know this as they refused to delete out the problem email on 3 occasions, so the alternative is to stop using the email and let it expire or set up email filters to block all unknown emails which is the solution I have implemented and will only allow known emails to be received thus stopping any illegal activity, spam, blackmail etc.

Perhaps virgin should allow for emails to be removed if they are pwned and have illegal activity, by consent.

In cases where illegal activity or scams are taking place using your email address, you should have the right to be able to change email address or delete the email address to prevent criminal activity involving an email address, and most email providers do allow this , so why is VM different in only allowing removal of secondary email addresses but not the removal of  a primary email address if requested by the customer where the email  address has been targeted by hackers and scammers?

However the virgin spam tagging is generally good and does catch a lot of the spam emails but not all of them, as some use gmail, outlook, and hotmail email sender addresses which get through.