Internet Scam: PayPal Account Problem

Here is an email I received this morning that looked super dangerous. It's a common scam, one that I discuss in my book, Top 10 Email Scams. It is a phishing scam (the email is set up to look exactly like an email coming from your bank or in this case from paypal.com) where the emails says there is a problem with your account and you need to click on the link in order to reactivate or resolve the problem. It's usually focusing on your bank account or paypal account, where they can get access to your money.

This email also looks loaded with a link that will do damage to your computer - it was written in HTML so the actual link is hidden from the user (unless you mouse over it without clicking on it) but look at what the actual link says - reboot.php... gads, that can't be good at all! And in the headers, it looked like they were set up to be falsified by the scammer but he didn't even bother to do that, because all he wants is for his victims to click on that link. Lord help the people that do.

Paypal is targeted so often for these scams that they have trouble sending legitimate emails to their users. Whenever I get an email from what looks like my bank or from paypal, I NEVER ever click on the link in the email. I open a new browser window and manually type in paypal.com (don't cut and paste from the email either) and track down if there is actually a real problem or not. Almost always, there is never a real problem. Worst case, pick up the phone and call them to check if the email is real or not.

Please be careful with these emails!

Received: by control.yourdomain.com (Postfix, from userid 0)
    id D65398EF53; Tue, 28 Aug 2012 12:22:21 +0300 (EEST)
To:
Subject: [Ticket ##204496300##] - Your PayPal account has been limited
X-PHP-Originating-Script: 33:x.php
From: PayPal [service@secure.com]
Content-Type: text/html
Message-Id: [20120828092614.D65398EF53@control.yourdomain.com]
Date: Tue, 28 Aug 2012 12:22:21 +0300 (EEST)
Return-Path: root@control.yourdomain.com

Dear Valued Member,

Following an audit of your account, we must advise that your account has been limited. PayPal is constantly working to ensure security by regularly screening the accounts in our system. We recently reviewed your account, and we need more information to help us provide you with secure service. Until we can collect this information, your access to sensitive account features will be limited. We would like to restore your access as soon as possible, and we apologize for the inconvenience.

- Why is my account access limited?

- Your account access has been limited for the following reason(s):

We have reason to believe that your account was accessed by a third party. Because protecting the security of your account is our primary concern, we have limited access to sensitive PayPal account features. We understand that this may be an inconvenience but please understand that this temporary limitation is for your protection.

- Please follow the link bellow and restore your account access

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_login-run [actually links to: http://erpdev.4iapps.com/paypal.com-us.gi.bin.webscr.cmd/reboot.php]

Please accept our apologies for any possible inconvenience,however PayPal must adhere to strict security standards which are there to protect your account privacy. Please be aware that your account will remain limited until you comply with this request.

We thank you in advance for your cooperation in this matter.

Kind regards,
PayPal Account Review Department