Solved: Virgin.net email password - how to change it - Virgin Media Community - 5336287

My virgin.net email password has been compromised (some hacker says he knows it).... how do I change it?

Thanks

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@nickjesse wrote:
My virgin.net email password has been compromised.... how do I change it?

Looking back at your posting history on the forum I see that your household still has a VM broadband account.

However, I would just say that if your Virgin.net email account is not actually linked to that broadband account it could disappear at any time.

VM stopped issuing new email addresses over a year ago so they clearly don't see the provision of an email service as being a part of their business plan going forward. They do seem to be having a purge on deleting old email accounts that are not linked to a live broadband account, presumably to facilitate whatever plans they have for the future all VM email accounts.

I'll just leave that thought with you.

However, to answer your question, see below the new process to reset a VM email account password.

Coenoby

To reset an email account password sign in from this link https://my.virginmedia.com/home/signIn using the VM email address and existing password of the account you wish to reset. That will take you to the relevant "My Virgin Media" account for that email address.

Then click on the "Account settings" tab and then the "Account details" tab. Scroll down that page and you will see a place to edit the password. While you are on that page, make sure you set up a Password Recovery Question.

Virgin Media have recently made another change to their email service which means that when you reset a VM email password you now have to generate an app specific password to use instead or your webmail password when accessing that email address via any third party email apps or clients on all your devices.

To do that scroll down the "Accounts details" page to "Mailbox app password management." and click on "Manage".

You can then generate an app password which will be in the format: video-post-mossy-sharp

You will then need to enter that new app password (including the "-") into the password field in the email apps on your various devices.

I'm a Very Insightful Person, I'm here to share knowledge, I don't work for Virgin Media.

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9 REPLIES 9

@nickjesse wrote:
My virgin.net email password has been compromised.... how do I change it?

Looking back at your posting history on the forum I see that your household still has a VM broadband account.

However, I would just say that if your Virgin.net email account is not actually linked to that broadband account it could disappear at any time.

VM stopped issuing new email addresses over a year ago so they clearly don't see the provision of an email service as being a part of their business plan going forward. They do seem to be having a purge on deleting old email accounts that are not linked to a live broadband account, presumably to facilitate whatever plans they have for the future all VM email accounts.

I'll just leave that thought with you.

However, to answer your question, see below the new process to reset a VM email account password.

Coenoby

To reset an email account password sign in from this link https://my.virginmedia.com/home/signIn using the VM email address and existing password of the account you wish to reset. That will take you to the relevant "My Virgin Media" account for that email address.

Then click on the "Account settings" tab and then the "Account details" tab. Scroll down that page and you will see a place to edit the password. While you are on that page, make sure you set up a Password Recovery Question.

Virgin Media have recently made another change to their email service which means that when you reset a VM email password you now have to generate an app specific password to use instead or your webmail password when accessing that email address via any third party email apps or clients on all your devices.

To do that scroll down the "Accounts details" page to "Mailbox app password management." and click on "Manage".

You can then generate an app password which will be in the format: video-post-mossy-sharp

You will then need to enter that new app password (including the "-") into the password field in the email apps on your various devices.

I'm a Very Insightful Person, I'm here to share knowledge, I don't work for Virgin Media.

Have I helped? Click Mark as Helpful Answer or use Kudos to say thanks

Hi Coenoby

Many thanks for your prompt reply. Unfortunately I have a problem: when I go to https://my.virginmedia.com/home/signIn

and enter my email address and password the next screen says my existing password is incorrect. (it was correct as of March 2023 but correctly hacked in April --- thats why I need to change it.)

When I click to reset a NEW password i get messages saying "cannot use that password choose another"... I have entered infinite new passwords but none are accepted. Please can you investigate and set up a new password that actually works for my virgin.net email? Much appreciated!

cheers

Nick

@nickjesse wrote:
Unfortunately I have a problem: when I go to https://my.virginmedia.com/home/signIn
and enter my email address and password the next screen says my existing password is incorrect.
When I click to reset a NEW password i get messages saying "cannot use that password choose another"... I have entered infinite new passwords but none are accepted.

I am sorry to say that my warning about the account getting deleted may have come too late.

From what you say, it seems to be showing all the classic signs that point to the fact that the account has been deleted - or more likely it is in the first stages of that inevitable deletion process.

I am not a VM employee but I can say that VM's first step to deleting an "orphan" email account appears to be to block access to the webmail account but to leave the mailbox itself still live for the time being. That means, it may still be accessible by email apps and clients because they access the email account via the SMTP server directly rather than the webmail account.

If you normally access you Virgin.net account via the VM website you could try using an email app to download the emails via an email app.

If you have a Windows 10 or 11 device you should have Microsoft's free "Mail" app or you could down load a free email app such as https://www.thunderbird.net . If you use a mobile device there are lots free email apps you can install.

All of those are easy to set up. You just have to enter the email address and the current password and they do the rest. When setting up the Virgin.net account in the app, go for the IMAP option rather than POP3 because IMAP will download all emails you have sent and received. POP3 just downloads the emails you have received.

Two health warnings:

I cannot guarantee it will work - it does require you to know the correct password and it does assume that the email account is still accessible via the SMTP route
But I can definitely guarantee that even if it does work it will not be a long term solution to continued use of this account. VM will delete the account completely, probably sooner rather than later.

I hope that advice is helpful to you. The bottom line is that you really need to set up a new non VM email account such as Gmail, Outlook.com or Yahoo.

Coenoby

I'm a Very Insightful Person, I'm here to share knowledge, I don't work for Virgin Media.

Have I helped? Click Mark as Helpful Answer or use Kudos to say thanks

Hi nickjesse,

Thank you for reaching out to us here on the Community.

We are very sorry to hear you are receiving these message that your password has been compromised.

We would be happy to assist with getting this resolved so I am going to pop you over a private message to take a few more details. This will be available via the red bar at the top of the page.

Speak soon,

Nat

Hi..I have exactly the same issue as nickjessie..

I have received many emails recently advising requests have been made to change password.. LinkedIn, insta etc.. I now can’t access my virgin.net email and have received a ransom request, which I can’t send on as my email password seems to have been changed… by the hacker!!

thanks in advance

rob

Hey AirBob11,

Welcome to the community and thanks for taking the time to post here on the forums.
I’m sorry to hear of the issues that you’re having with your email account at the moment, are you able to login to your online 'My Virgin Media' account, if you are able to do so, please can you try the below method to reset your password:

• Sign in to My Virgin Media
• Go to Account settings, then Account details
• Tap Manage next to Manage your Virgin Media Mail app password under Virgin Media Mail
• Then, under Virgin Media Mail app password tap Get password
• Continue the flow and a new secure password will be generated, and the mailbox unlocked
• Update any third-party apps that may be use to access your Virgin Media Mail emails with this new app password.

If this doesn't work, please let me know and we can get this looked into further with our support team.

Kind Regards,

Steven_L

Thanks for the advice, unfortunately this hasn’t helped. Possibly due to it being a VIRGIN.NET email address.? The IMAP and SMTP settings seem to have been changed by the hacker?

thank you

rob

Thanks for coming back to us AirBob11, I would be happy to take a further look into this for you but first I would need to confirm a few details via private message, please look out for my message and we can get started.
Kind Regards,
Steven_L

Hey AirBob11,

Please can you try to login to your email account again for me? You may need to use the forgotten password link to be able to get into your account.

Kind Regards,

Steven_L