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I think an ex-friend who knows my personal information is obtaining a new password and reading my Yahoo mail. I made a claim to the abuse department at Yahoo. Is there anyway they can find out who is doing this so I can verify if it is the person I think it is? Any info would be great. Thanks, Sarah ;)
Ok, this may be a little over the top, but try this.
1) Find someone to setup a website with a picture. "blah.jpg" Have this person set log atributes on it, so that any IP that accesses the file will be logged.
2) E-mail yourself an e-mail called something that would get her/his attention. "My Best Friend Sucks!!" or something like that.
3) In the e-mail reference to the picture that is directed towards the site. Example: http://www.whatever.com/blah.jpg
4) When you open the e-mail, your computer goes out to the site to download the picture and it is logged. Leave the e-mail in your inbox. If someone is reading your mail they won't be able to resist. When they open the message, it will be logged. Time/Date, IP, etc.
Then you can do a trace, find out what the ISP is, when they did it, etc.
5) This works great for message boards (too) if you want to find the IP of people posting but don't have administrative access. Wouldn't we all like to nuke the trolls that post on message boards, but no one knows where they are at in this world ;)
This is just one way, a few others will get you in trouble, so I better not go there :p
Almost no E-mail provider will actually release the password of a user.
What they usually do is re-set it and give out the new password.
Can you still access your E-mail? If you can, then they did not get
the password that way.
I assume you've changed your password, and your "Secret Question"
I'd reccomend using garbage for the secret answer, That way it cant be
used against you.
-8trak
Thanks for the responses. As to 8trak's question yes, I can access my email, but only after I answer the secret question, etc and get a new password. knightmb, I have a question, if I can find the IP address, how could I link this to "the suspect"? Thank you. (P.S. forgive me if this seem like a simple question)
Well it has to work on this principle. The picture that was linked to the e-mail is only known by you. For example if the picture name was eicnziziqji.jpg then there is no way someone is going to "accidentally" access this file from the server. The only one that will know about this file is you and the person running the website that is helping you. When you set the bait, two things can happen. No one except you has accessed the file "matching to time/date/IP address". If set the bait last week and only one "hit" has been recorded for that file from you. Then no one else has read that e-mail. But..... if you notice that the file was accessed on a Wednesday at 9:00pm for example and you know that you only read the e-mail once, or wasn't even online at that time, then someone else was reading it. Be it someone who broke into yahoo mail or somone who has your password. You remember the old tricks or putting tape on doors or windows to see if they were open. This is the same thing, except in the electronic sense. You will know about the bait, thus you can rule yourself out. Anyone else must be the person who stole your account. If you are lucky, maybe the IP traces back to something easy like an AOL address or an MSN address. If your friend uses either of these two services, then put the two together. They use this ISP and it just so happens someone other than me read that e-mail at this time/date. It may not have exact names to point to, but this is a start. I know this may seem a little extreme, but most (not all) ISP providers log which users use the internet and their IP's at which times/dates. About the only thing that would make them hand over this information is some sort of legal action or lawsuit.
If the content of your yahoo mail isn't sensitive or important, I suggest you e-mail everyone in your address book that you are getting a new e-mail address. Make a new yahoo account and just forget about your friend that secretly uses your account. And remember, never ever tell anyone your password again. Friends should understand privacy, no need for them to demand they know your password.
one thing is unclear here :confused:Quote:
yes, I can access my email, but only after I answer the secret question, etc and get a new password.
if u each time answer the question and get a new passwd then why not change ur secret ques?
if any friend of urs is changing the passwd everytime then it means he doesn't know ur passwd but probably knows ur sec answer. :)