Scam: MaiIbox Storage Quota Limit

I've been seeing more and more of the "fake account warning" types of phishing emails lately, so am assuming others are as well. In the last week I've seen about ten of these types in my inbox:

PHISHING

They use several tricks to make you think it's a legitimate notification:

  • They include your email address in the text of the message
  • They tack on a fake "virus free" message from Avast (at the bottom)
  • They try to make it seem like it's "from" a legitimate source by using "cpanel" in the from name (though they capitalize it wrong - it would be cPanel or cpanel)

They of course use the standard fear tactic to get you to act before thinking... by making you think you're about to lose the ability to use your email...

"Your email storage has exceeded its limits and needs to be increased immediately click below to add more space on time to avoid missing new emails"

Though they contradict themselves, by showing a progress bar at 19.84 out 20.00 GB of space, and then say you've exceeded your limit rather than that you're about to.

Just remember the number one rule of emails... never click on a link in an email you weren't expecting. You can hover the mouse over a link or button to see the actual address it would go to if clicked (most browsers will show that link in the lower corner of the window.)  If you think there's a chance the notification is legitimate, the best thing to do is log in to your account directly to check it's status. Or, contact your service provider directly. 

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Posted on by Nathan Lyle in Email, Security, Spam Hall of Shame and tagged , , , , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

About Nathan Lyle

Nathan is a father of four, an amateur musician, and an aspiring photographer. He started programming in 4th grade on an Apple II+ and many years later spent much of his college years freelancing website design for college departments. Nathan is a veteran of the Browser Wars, and will gladly talk at length about the changes he has seen in Web technology if you accidentally ask him.

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