Hacked to Pieces

My computer got hacked this week and I feel totally violated!
I am not really sure how the hacker got into my emails because I really watch what I allow in there and since they completely wiped everything out- I can't go back and check.

I remember a couple things-one from Verizon and one from Loft asking me to take a survey. I wonder if that is how they got certain information about me such as my email address and date of birth, etc. Whatever it was, once they got in, they took my entire contact email address list and sent everyone a nice little email telling them I was stranded in London without my passport and needed $2345 to get home. Could they please lend it to me and I would pay them back as soon as I got back home? Most of the people in my contact list know me well enough that they laughed at this because they knew #1. I would never ask them for money this way and #2. I wouldn't be stupid enough to use such bad grammar if I did.

The first thing I did was call the credit card companies and the banks and alert them to possible fraud. This was so much fun because, while most of them will just watch the accounts, some of them made us close the accounts and issue new cards. Pain in the Ass!

Next up, call Verizon and see if they can retrieve any of my information. No such luck.You see not only did these guys take my email addresses, they took every thing else I had stored in folders in there too. I had pictures people had emailed me, information about my daughter's upcoming wedding, school websites I use frequently, order confirmations from online shopping.
The assholes took it all! And you know all they will do with it is throw it away, so why take it? I had to settle for getting my email to function again.

We called the police and reported this and he will LOOK into it but he says there isn't much they can do about it because they didn't ask for $2400! Yup that's the magic number people. As long as someone commits Internet theft and asks you for money, it isn't a crime if they keep the amount under $2400!! What kind of bullshit is that!

So now I am paranoid as hell every time I send or receive an email at home. I am constantly checking my bank accounts to make sure there is no activity happening there. I change the password on my accounts every 24 hours and if someone sends me something that looks the least bit suspicious- it goes to SPAM! It ain't fun to be hacked.