scam verify microsoft account?

Anonymous
2013-09-19T08:07:17+00:00

I have now received 6 e-mails in 24 hours from the Microsoft account team thanking me for verifying my account, giving me a pin code and recommending me to go to account.live.com and change the password if I did not request the code. I have seen several on-line discussions about this some saying it is a scam. Most end up going to private communication. I think it is a scam. Is it and what is the solution? I have summarised briefly what I did below.

  1. When I saw the 2 messages first thing in the morning I panicked and I went to the account.live.com link.
  2. Having changed the password I got worried as I saw that the hotmail account name was not exactly mine - an underscore added but difficult to see as all text was underlined. So within 2 or 3 minutes of changing my Outlook password I went directly into my Outlook account, my gmail account and my skype account and changed all 3 passwords.
  3. 2 hours later I got exactly the same type of e-mail from the Microsoft account team but now with my correct outlook address. Seemed to confirm my worst fears - it looked like a hacker had picked up info from me using the link to account.live.com - but thankfully I had changed the passwords again directly through my accounts.
  4. Later last night I got 3 more e-mails from the Microsoft account team all at the same time. These reverted back to the incorrect hotmail name used at the start.. I am ignoring them for now.

I may be somewhat paranoid but none of the above looks like the normal behaviour of a professional Microsoft team or system.

I have run AVG and Msoft safety scanner - no problems found. I have tried using the Msoft Security Support Centre and the Get Support sites - these can both be accessed but both of them do not work. So now I am trying the forum. Please can someone help.

Thanks AJD.

Outlook | Web | Outlook.com | Account management, security, and privacy

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Anonymous
2013-09-19T16:07:45+00:00

Hi cynwit,

Thank you for posting your issue in Microsoft Community.

We understand your concern about the security of your account and we will assist you. I would like to inform you and as mentioned by AJD 62  that the email you have received is a form of Phishing scam and the intention is to steal your personal information. If you have replied to a phishing email with your billing or other critical information, your account may be compromised.

Scammers may misuse your personal information to access your account, make unauthorized transactions, send out fraudulent emails or engage in other illegal activities. Similarly, if you have clicked on a suspicious link, your computer may get infected with a virus, spyware or malware.

Please be reminded that Microsoft will not send emails asking for personal information. I highly suggest for you to Mark as Junk and Mark as Phishing any emails from that sender and disregard it by deleting the message. To learn more about Phishing scams, you can read this article:

How to recognize if the email I have received is genuine or spam/ phishing?

You can also report this to our Microsoft Online Safety Team. To do this, please refer to this article for more information:

Report abuse, phishing, or spam in Outlook.com

Please do not entertain this type of email and report it to us.

Kindly let us know the results. Your cooperation and understanding is highly appreciated.

Thanks!

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Anonymous
2014-07-06T20:30:48+00:00

Hi JohnHowe2,

Thank you for bringing this to our attention. Does the email you've received has a Green Icon on the email header? If so, we can say that it is a legitimate email from Microsoft. And since you can confirm that you did not request for this code, then someone is trying to request a code to gain entry to your account. Having that said, changing your password and updating your account is the primary action we have to take. This will protect your account from unauthorized access. To do so, please refer to the link below:

Reset Password

Furthermore, please visit the article below on how to strengthen the security on your Microsoft account:

Make your Microsoft account more secure

Should you have other questions regarding Outlook.com, please do not hesitate to use this forum so we, as well as the community, can help you resolve the issue for you.

Regards,

Francis S.

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Anonymous
2017-04-05T11:40:15+00:00

Hello,

You have the privilege to block unwanted emails from unfamiliar email addresses. To do this, simply follow the instruction found in this article - Block a Mail Sender.

If you wish to filter them, you can also refer to this article - Use Junk Email Filters. Should you have further questions regarding this, feel free to post on this thread.

Regards.

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  1. Anonymous
    2014-09-28T14:00:20+00:00

    Hi,

    Welcome to Microsoft Community.

    I understand that you want to know if the email that you received is legit or not. Let me assist you with this.

    I am afraid I would not be able to determine if the email that you received is really from Microsoft as I am not seeing the exact email that you are referring to. I can provide you an article on how to identify if emails are just phishing scam message or hoax. You may refer on the article below for more details.

    How to recognize phishing email messages, links, or phone calls

    Also, you can see a green shield icon beside email's subject line if it is really from Microsoft.

    I hope I was able to help you. Should you have any other Outlook.com related concerns, please let us know.

    Regards,

    Grace

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  2. Anonymous
    2014-10-05T17:08:31+00:00

    I received the following message recently while travelling and trying to access my Hotmail account:

    Unusual sign-in activity
    We detected something unusual about a recent sign-in to the Microsoft account li*****@hotmail.com. To help keep you safe, we required an extra security challenge.
    Sign-in details:<br><br><br>...<br><br><br><br> If this was you, then you can safely ignore this email. <br> --- <br> If you're not sure this was you, a malicious user might have your password. Please review your recent activity and we'll help you take corrective action.

    I tried to reply:

    "You are not keeping me safe.  You are merely ensuring that I am completely cut off from email communication while I am travelling (WITH an iPad but WITHOUT a cellphone -- a circumstance which seems to be entirely outside your perception of reality, given the choices for obtaining the precious "code" now necessary because I'm not at home).

    I hope you appreciate the irony of your blocking my email access on my mobile, portable device because I'm being "mobile" and have taken my (portable) device with me.

    Should you wish to revisit your current process and allow me to access my email while I'm "mobile", my email account is: ..."

    Can you please amend your process to allow a quick and easy solution to your perception of "unusual activity" which does not automatically involve a cell phone -- for example, perhaps security questions would provide legitimacy.

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