E-mail hijacking is more often than not, a prelude to identity theft. For whatever purpose this is done (bogus messages to friends, 419 etc.), the effect is always disastrous as our e-mail account is usually that principal portal that connects us to other platforms such as our facebook profiles, twitter handles and the rest of them. Many things may tip you off that your e-mail account has been hacked On things to do, we offer these tips:

1. Change your password.

If the wizards who hacked into your account forgot to change your password and you can still log in — do it immediately and change that password. Oh, and make it stronger, stranger and less “you.” That means no birthdays, addresses, kids’ names, dogs’ names, maiden names, favorite movie names, favorite band names, or anything else that you might otherwise feature on your Facebook page.

2. Recapture your account.

If your access is blocked, follow the directions on the email site help center. Once you again become the master of your email kingdom, invent a very sophisticated password, change your security questions and get creative in your answers because the hacker may well have nailed those questions correctly in the first place.

3. Report the incident to the email site.

Your email provider has seen this type of thing before and may be able to provide you with further details about the nature and source of the attack, as well as any tools they may have available to protect your information and get you back up and running. (You may also have access to identity protection services through your insurance company, bank, credit union or employer).

4. Speak to your peeps.

Notify everyone on your contact list that you have been compromised and they should look at any communication from you with suspicion for the time being. Further, they should double down on their computer protection. If they have already been victimized, offer your condolences and support, and make sure they are following these steps, too.

5. Scan your computer with an updated anti-virus program.

Don’t think that sophisticated email hackers are in it for the fun of grabbing your email and then doing a spam conga line. Often their goal is much more insidious. Why crawl into a life unless you can truly monetize it? Therefore, beware of the Trojan.

In this case however, they may have inserted it into your system so that it can conduct recon and report back to them with all of your passwords or a treasure trove of your information. Get that program running and eliminate any and all viruses, spyware or malware that it discovers. If you don’t have a new and sophisticated security software program, now is not the time to cheap out. It’s a reasonable investment that will ultimately show a serious return by keeping your information yours.

6. Don’t fail to review your personal email settings.

Make sure the cyber ninjas haven’t created forwarding email addresses and if you find any delete them immediately. Also, look carefully at the signature block and make sure it’s really yours. The hackers may have included some malicious links there too.

7. Change passwords or security questions for other sites.

In the event you shared your email passwords or security questions with any other site, change them, too. Too often consumers opt for convenience (or simplicity) over security and use a single password for multiple websites — including financial services, social media, retail or secondary email sites. Not a good idea. In fact it’s a very bad idea. Change all of them and use different passwords for each.

8. Check your email folders.

Folks have a tendency to send financial or personally identifiable information to others via email and then archive the offending email in a file in their system. If so, immediately go to whatever account is identified and change the user ID and password.

9. Monitor!

Assuming that the hacker in question was able to find either your valuable pieces of personally identifiable information, it will become important for you to monitor your credit and various financial accounts for suspicious activity.


Remember, your email is an important component of your identity portfolio. You must manage it like an investment. Since, prevention is usually better than cure, also do good to make sure that all measures are put in place to guide against your e-mail being hacked.

Additional info from Techbyte

http://www.tutubranch.com/2013/07/hacked-email-solutions.html

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