Trojan Via Facebook

[annieigma]

I recently got suspended from facebook, for no apparant reason. they wouldnt tell me why, I did not post any dodgy stuff etc, I am not a stupid kid, just talk to friends etc. I re-registered with another email address, same name and address etc. that was o.k. but facebook went into my email box and showed all my email contacts as possible "friends", some with photos ( these are people who are customers etc.) two days later, a trojan gets into my computer and sends all these people a load of nonsense. I received 76 email failure messages to email that I had not sent. I have had several people email me and say they have received rubbish from me. I am using AVG, the free version, which said every thing was O.K. I did a scan, came back clear, nothing found.
anyone know what that was all about?? was facebook involved?? Did I slip up and go to a dummy facebook site?
any answers appreciated, thank you.

[boxtops]

Viruses can get hold of your email by many methods - have you got a good virus protection package on your computer? We've got Norton running all the time, but we still receive loads of dodgy emails into our spam filter.

[Ronnie10]

I'm very weary of these free anti virus and malware/spyware as i've seen someone install a trojan and spyware on a computer with mse and malwarebytes free versions and the scans came back as everything fine, however when the test was done with paid antiviruses they caught them straight away.

People have to remember that the paid versions have many active staff whose obligation is to be up to date with all attacks out there, the free ones don't owe you anything so if something gets through it's just unfortunate.

The scary thing is that people use online banking and other important things whilst free versions offer hardly any protection at all so there could be eyes watching their every move with them unaware anythings amiss.

[Huderon]

Since the rubbish emails were sent to your contacts, chances are your email account has been hacked, so change your password and choose a strong one, and while you are at it check that the email address or phone number to be used if you forget your password is correct and hasn't been changed.

If you have a look in your sent folder, you might find the rubbish emails in there, which will confirm that the account was hacked.

Now, I don't use Facebook, so can't say for certain, but I know a lot of social networking sites ask you for your email address and password so they can show you if any of your contacts are already on that site. Facebook may well do the same. The idea is to list your contacts as potential "friends" or to email them in your name inviting them to join the site. I never provide that information, and tend to get a bit annoyed by the emails supposedly from friends who have been silly enough to do so.

If the emails sent genuinely were rubbish and not invites to Facebook, it's unlikely that Facebook sent them - it's not in their interests to spam the contacts of their members. So I'd guess that the email address you used to sign up again was one which is already out on the net somewhere and was targeted to be hacked.

If you want to double check the results of the AVG scan, Kapersky have a security scan program which you can download from http://www.kaspersky.com/security-scan - it will only detect and report on any malware and not remove it, and it won't conflict with AVG. If it finds anything, you can get their virus removal tool from http://www.kaspersky.com/virus-scanner and you can delete either or both from your computer when you have finished with them.

[daffy654]

Ronnie10, I'm sure you mean 'wary' not weary, although both 'sort of' make sense in the context you are using.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with most of the free anti virus products. Most virus' are picked up by visiting dodgy sites or downloading dodgy software. If people were more careful about their web browsing habits they would be much less likely to infects their PCs.