I have been receiving threatening emails by someone telling me to put bitcoin in their account or they will show videos of me, but what worries me is they know one of my passwords. I cannot remember which accounts have this password but it is one of the password I have used. I have Norton security but have used the library on occasion
Threatened by Hacker, Knows One of My Passwords
screensaver on 28/10/2019 - 09:16
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I know this as I have had them on occasion. Freaked me out for a minute as it was a password of mine, but I realised it was an old one. Not current. The one I got claimed they had videos of me 'enjoying myself' to adult videos online (which, as an adult male, I would NEVER do) and they would send them to my entire address list.
:)
Very well known scam. There was an amusing discussion here on the same email.
I got the same email with the same threat.
The thought of my friends watching a video of me strangling the snake made me fall of my seat laughing.
Could you add me to your address list please? O^0
just in case.. you know… I… I could… let you know… err.. if I got any vids. :-)
There are adult videos on the internet? I just didn't know that.
If its a password you still use, just make sure you update and change all sites that you use it with.
You shouldn't be using the same password across multiple sites. Get a password manager. Lastpass is free and will save you the hassle of forgetting passwords.
Best practice is obviously not to use the same password - If one gets leaked it can be used at the other one.
TBH I'm not super worried if someone was to hack my Ozbargain account. I'd still prefer I didn't get hacked at all but if I can only remember 10 passwords I'd rather have a general password for some logins, and keep secure ones for what I think are important.
Password managers have their own set of risks in terms of access to the manager. In many instances it will be a good solution but in the same way 2-factor authentication isn't always the best solution.
Thanks. I have had a lot of accounts, survey sites etc, even banking. I actually had an interview with that bank employee and he was a very strange person
You happy to paste what was said on here? Obviously take out all information thats sensitive…
"I have more videos. Please subscribe so I can continue to produce quality content. Thanks"
Change passwords, use different passwords for different things, use complex passwords with a variety of upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols. Don’t use generic passwords
Check logins on accounts such as social media accounts etc
You shouldn’t have anything to worry about
That one's not a big deal! However as suggested by a few here, I would start reviewing your passwords especially if you only use one for everything. Also if you want to check if your email has been compromised from one of the sites (you accessed before) you can go to https://haveibeenpwned.com/
Ignore. Its bullsh&t.
Even if you paid that Bitcoin ransom, guessing it's some generic amount like 0.1 or 0.02, due to the nature of a BTC transaction your 'hacker' can't identify from that payment it was specifically you that made it.
Even if they could due to very the nature of blackmail would see them up the stakes. They'd never let you off their leash.Copy/paste their provided BTC address here https://www.blockchain.com/explorer to see how much, most likely none at all, their scam has earned so far.
Moving forwards cover your camera for piece of mind and change passwords as mentioned in other posts.
"Even if you paid that Bitcoin ransom, guessing it's some generic amount like 0.1 or 0.02.."
The one I got last week wanted $799 USD in BC.
This is assuming they have only one bitcoin address and aren't creating a new one for each victim
I'm fairly sure I remember someone posting this exact scam on OB a few months back, just keep on rollin' OP and make sure your passwords are all up to date with 2fa where possible.
What videos do you have of yourself that you would be concerned about?
( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Do you want to risk your family and friends seeing your browsing history?
theres nothing embarrassing except w/o makeup, bad hair day etc
They don't have anything, and you're probably not even the target audience.
These scams are usually meant for computer-illiterate guys who've been on porn sites.
Just ignore it and definitely don't reply to it.Chuck your email address in here and see if your passwords have been exposed:
https://haveibeenpwned.com/To avoid actual hackers, do the following:
- Setup a password manager like https://keepassxc.org/
- Generate a unique random password for each site with the password manager, and reset your passwords to these.
- Chuck the .kdbx file on dropbox/gdrive/some other online storage and run it from there so that it stays sync'd.
- (optional) get the app on android/ios so you can use your passwords on the go, use dropbox/gdrive/whatever to keep it in sync.
Maybe ur password was left in your folder, and the hacker is your weekend course teacher.
100% first class bullshit
Have a beer and relax
Reaffirming what's been stated above, common scam.
I have thousands of these email is anyone wants some!
As everyone is saying, it's a 100% fishing scam looking for fools ready to hand over money. They have got a password DB from somewhere and are using that to scare people into believing they really have infected you.
Hey Friend!
check your email accountss on here: https://haveibeenpwned.com/
Its a list of which emails have been linked with passwords, from what sites and from when. Its not comprehensive because they don't want people to be able to look up if they were leaked from a dating site etc. Should narrow down which leak they got your password from.As above, ignore threats. Also, change your passwords, especially the one that is known. I used a tiered system to balance between using different passwords for each account and not being able to remember them and the same password but it being a risk like here.
I have 'throw away' passwords I use for things (like Ozbargain coincidently), then another medium tier where I reuse a couple passwords by category then have unique passwords for things I don't actually want people getting into (banks, emails) as they would actually cause some damage.
I used a tiered system to balance between using different passwords for each account and not being able to remember them and the same password but it being a risk like here.
Making up passwords is insecure compared to using a password manager.
Humans are hopeless at coming up with random passwords.
Depending on what password manager you use it's also easier to use.
Oh definitely insecure vs a password manager that generates a randomised password. The question isn't if its more secure, its if it is secure enough for the purpose, and what the risk vs reward is for both cases.
Humans are bad at making random passwords because they need remember them. Trusting in storage rather than remembering a password has its own risks (putting all your passwords together —> theft or loss of the centralised password set. Any benefits of
TBH from my perspective you'd get a more palatable overall result by using extended password lengths (20 characters+) of a systematic and predictable nature:
ThisIsMyOzBargainPasswordFor2019PleaseDontHackMe
^ As far as I know this would be difficult for most traditional attacks to deal with.
Do you have compromising videos?
I recommend getting something like the LastPass browser add-on and then changing all your passwords and more importantly, using a unique random password for each website.
From an expert in Cyber Security… using Norton is your first problem to deal with here.
From a non expert in Cyber Security… using Norton is your first problem to deal with here.
From Norton… using advice from ozbargain users is your first problem to deal with here
Very annoying, but I have a password manager, was easy to check I don't use that password for anything anymore. Oh and I don't have a webcam. Not that I would care anyway, there are literally billions of naked human bodies on this planet, it would mean nothing for mine to be seen, they're all essentially the same. Get a group of even 50 naked people together for those public art photos and you realise very quickly that you can't tell them apart.
got the same email in my spam folder, pressed delete. lol
cant believe you thought its real :)
Thank you for the link to “haveibeenpwned”above.
That gave me 3 places my email was breached as I received the scam email a month or two ago. So great to know HOW it got out there!I don't have time to find it now, but someone posted a hilarious response to this scam by saying "oh I didn't know I had an audience, I would have put on more of a performance, please find attached a longer and higher quality video".
It got better from there, but is probably not true. Never know though.
If you haven't already, go watch Black Mirror - Shut Up and Dance.
Ignore it.
They've gotten access to old passwords somewhere from some website that's spilled them and now they are doing a phishing exercise to get money.
For peace of mind just copy the text of the message they sent and paste it into google and add the word 'scam' and I guarantee you will see that hundreds of others have had the same message and some poor fools have paid. Once you have paid that money is gone.
If its a password you still use, just make sure you update and change all sites that you use it with.