cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

virginmedia.com email hacked?

Warblers01
On our wavelength

Our virginmedia.com email stopped working yesterday so we went into our VM dashboard to reset the password. We've since received several 'bounce back' emails from accounts we don't recognise - they look as though someone has tried to use our email address for phishing. Also had a Facebook message to say that someone in the United States had tried to access our profile yesterday. Coincidence...? I doubt it! 

Anyone else had problems with the virginmedia.com email server lately and/or phishing messages...?

Thanks!

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

Accepted Solutions

coenoby
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person

@Warblers01 wrote:

We just wonder if the virginmedia.com server has been compromised....?


Most data breaches involving email addresses come from the customer / membership databases of businesses or online services that we all use.

Just as an example, almost a  year ago it came to light that the email addresses of 2.5 million Facebook users had been stolen and made available to hackers. That was part of a much larger Facebook data breach that saw the telephone numbers of 553 million Facebook users across 106 countries ending up in the hands of scammers. See here for an overview https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-56745734 

If you have reason to believe that your Virgin Media email address has been part of a data breach you need to check one or both of these sites:

Both those sites are trusted and well respected in data security circles. When you enter your email address they check to see if it has been offered for sale on the Dark Web. If it has they tell you which organisation was responsible for the breach.

If you are concerned about security of your email account, I would strongly suggest that you use an email service such as Gmail or Outlook.com. They along with many others offer 2FA on their email accounts although they call it "2 Step Verification".

2FA is not the full answer to stopping hackers getting into your account but, for example, Gmail also advises you if someone has signed into your account from another location. To my  knowledge VM have never hinted at any plans to introduce it to the VM email service.

I hope that's helpful.

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

See where this Helpful Answer was posted

8 REPLIES 8

Martin_N
Forum Team
Forum Team

Hi Warblers01,

Thank you for your post. I'm very sorry to hear about your email address. 

I'm glad to hear you were able to get that sorted. 

Please do let us know if you need any assistance in the future. 

^Martin

No, it's not sorted. Still getting emails through from various platforms (Netflix, Facebook, EA Games, Ubisoft) with a password reset request, so someone is clearly trying to access our accounts using our virginmedia.com email. We have 2FA on Facebook, so at least we get notified when someone is trying to log into the account. We just wonder if the virginmedia.com server has been compromised....?

coenoby
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person

@Warblers01 wrote:

We just wonder if the virginmedia.com server has been compromised....?


Most data breaches involving email addresses come from the customer / membership databases of businesses or online services that we all use.

Just as an example, almost a  year ago it came to light that the email addresses of 2.5 million Facebook users had been stolen and made available to hackers. That was part of a much larger Facebook data breach that saw the telephone numbers of 553 million Facebook users across 106 countries ending up in the hands of scammers. See here for an overview https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-56745734 

If you have reason to believe that your Virgin Media email address has been part of a data breach you need to check one or both of these sites:

Both those sites are trusted and well respected in data security circles. When you enter your email address they check to see if it has been offered for sale on the Dark Web. If it has they tell you which organisation was responsible for the breach.

If you are concerned about security of your email account, I would strongly suggest that you use an email service such as Gmail or Outlook.com. They along with many others offer 2FA on their email accounts although they call it "2 Step Verification".

2FA is not the full answer to stopping hackers getting into your account but, for example, Gmail also advises you if someone has signed into your account from another location. To my  knowledge VM have never hinted at any plans to introduce it to the VM email service.

I hope that's helpful.

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 @Warblers01,

Have you tried resetting the password to your email account? I would recommend changing it to something entirely unique which has never been used for that account before.

Thanks,
 


Zach - Forum Team
New around here? To find out more about the Community Forums, take a look at our FAQs!


Warblers01
On our wavelength

Hi Zach, yes we've changed the password 4 or 5 times in the last week or so. Is there anything else we can do...?

That's very helpful, thanks so much for providing those links. 

We thought it probably was a data breach but had no idea where it originated! We both use Gmail and Outlook but the Virgin Media Email interface kept locking us out so we had to change the passwords several times.

Warblers01
On our wavelength

Hi Zach, have changed the password again and now getting '403 Forbidden' message when I try to view the mailbox on my browser or mobile device. I can't view my ntlworld.com mailbox either on a browser but it's fine via the Outlook app. Have tried clearing my cache, running an AV scan and updating passwords but the virginmedia.com mailbox remains unavailable...

Thanks for trying that Warblers01,

 

So I can help further, I'll need a few more details from you.

 

I've popped you over a private message for this (purple envelope, top right hand corner)

 

Alex_Rm