pardon the shouting, but *HELP!!!*

[HappyHippo]

yesterday I had 229 emails on my MSN hotmail account, and they were ALL emails I've apparently sent to people all over the globe from this company:
eworbt@eworbt.com
I haven't been on the website in case it's dodgy, and I haven't sent anyting back to them... but I had a phone call from a bloke at church tonight saying what the heck was this I've sent, so now it's sending to my contacts too.
What can I do? Any ideas? I've set up a different hotmail account, and I'm ignoring the other one, but I'm terrified I've inadvertently sent some kind of horrible killer virus into cyberspace!

help meeee.....

 

[Highlander II]

Run a virus scan ASAP.

If you don't have virus scanning software, hit google for a list of free online scans available or download one like avast!

You might also want to throw something into your list of contacts at the top like !aaaaa - so that when the worm tries to hit your contact list it will bomb b/c that first entry isn't valid. This probably won't help you right now, but in the future. Granted, I'm unsure of the validity of this particular trick, as I haven't actually tried it.

 

[HappyHippo]

will try it, thanks!

 

[Highlander II]

Also - don't send any 'real' email from your hotmail account either, as it'll just give the worm more 'food'.

And eworbt@eworbt.com comes up as some euro-currency website via google and it also seems to be affiliated with MSN. Now, that could be just 'fake' info on the website (that I'm not going to), or something else.

So, you may, once you clean your PC, want to contact MSN about this site and find out if they are sending spam around or know anything about it.

When Lenny pokes in here again, or one of the other more 'tech' oriented folks, they may have some other info or advice for you.

 

[Erin99]

I went to the website (I have the safe Opera! ) - it's just a place selling electrical items. Yes, they also have a Hotmail account as their e-mail address at the bottom of the page, so perhaps somehow your accounts have crossed?

However, it's pretty easy to hack into someone's e-mail account if they have an easy password. By the sounds of it someone's logged in and used it. Try changing your password to something with a combination of letters and numbers.

Like Highlander says, though, you can also have a virus that sends messages to everyone in your Microsoft Address Book (that's why you shouldn't use it, or Outlook) or Contacts List. You definitely do need to run a virus check and a spyware check.

Some good free virus checkers:

AVAST! (the one I used to have)
Avira (the one I have)
AVG (meh. Used to be good; now they miss some viruses)

Good free spyware/trojan checkers:

Spybot Search and Destroy
Lavasoft Ad-Aware

 

[Commonmind]

Follow all the advice from above, and then, as soon as possible, get a different email provider -- anything as far from Hotmail as is convenient.

 

[Erin99]

CM speaks wise words. I wouldn't go near it with a tadpole, even if someone paid me. Gmail is good, even if it doesn't allow you to send zips and exes.

 

[Sephiroth]

I've had far less trouble using my ISP mailbox than I ever did with webmail. It can be accessed as a webmail account, too.