When a recycled email address could come back to haunt you ...

Pacing Mule

I got a strange call from my mother yesterday informing me that facebook had set up an account for her with someone elses information on it. says me.

After a few minutes questioning her on exactly what happened I figured out what was going on.

She decided to create a second facebook account to play some games right from the start as she has reached highest levels etc (I'm fairly sure she could have just deleted the game(s) and then joined it again but that's a different story. Hell she could have wanted a private account for any number of illicit reasons I'm not going to dwell on )

In order to do this she needed a new email address so went and signed up for a hotmail address (via the new outlook site) which was her maiden name. I was surprised she could do this without putting in name1234 etc as the name would be common enough. But she did and it gave her the email address.

Back to facebook she goes and tries to create an account at which point it says that its already created and to click here for the password etc. She didn't realise at the time she was clicking through a forgotten password routine. Facebook emails here the password / she resets the current one and voila her "new" account is accessible.

The account though had 300+ friends on it, personal information and loads of photos (some as she put it racy which she was appalled at ) as well as message and user history etc of the actual owner of the account who hadn't updated the account since 2011.

Basically someone with her maiden name at one point opened a hotmail account, signed up to facebook and then stopped using the hotmail account / and or facebook account. Hotmail it turns out recycle old email addresses and she was given that email address. Thankfully she wasn't the sort to abuse this knowledge but it is a scary thought.

So the moral of this TLDR story is this - if you have used free email addresses from hotmail, gmail etc in the past that were used to sign up for services where personal info was entered or stored you better make sure that you keep using that address.

Now in true after hours style - let's play with the hypotheticals of having access to someone elses email account. What's the worst you could do with the information ? (not that you would of course !!!)

Fratton Fred

Your mother needs a hobby.

donvito99

The OP needs a hobby.

Peregrine

Surely you forgot to mention the bit where she changed the account owners status to "I'm gay"

Chucky the tree

I'm not sure why, but for some reason I get the impression your mother is a MILF from reading that story.

The Backwards Man

I need a hobby.

Unregistered.

Bullsh1t Story!

kneemos

What's you're mother wearing?

Pacing Mule

Fratton Fred wrote: »

Your mother needs a hobby.

donvito99 wrote: »

The OP needs a hobby.

We all need a hobby. It's baking hot outside and we're on boards.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Banned phrases in 5... 4... 3... 2...

Pacing Mule

Unregistered. wrote: »

Bullsh1t Story!

Not at all.

Have a google of "hotmail recycles email addresses"

It's a common practice which I thought would never have happened but it does. It's not a great leap therefore to see that if you have someones old address you are likely to come across sites where both of you would register. The second link in that search is someone who ended up with an email address linked to someone elses paypal account.

lahalane

I don't know how to benefit from having someones email address...I'm more of a fraper. I like to tell everyone available in the frape victims chat that I lost my phone and to ring it so I can find it.

Hownowcow

Stamp collecting is a hobby but apparently it doesn't impress women.

danniemcq

did the email address have a . in it, like firstname.lastname@hotmail.com or name.1234@hotmail.com

NEVER use . in email addresses it messes with the account and emails and stuff can go to the wrong people

Pacing Mule

danniemcq wrote: »

did the email address have a . in it, like firstname.lastname@hotmail.com or name.1234@hotmail.com

NEVER use . in email addresses it messes with the account and emails and stuff can go to the wrong people

It was firstnamelastname@ it was most likely registered early in hotmail history. It's a common enough name which I immediately assumed had to have been registered before she did. At the time I didn't know about the recycling.

Mars Bar

I was getting emails from Bebo for another person who had used my email address for their account long before I joined Bebo. She had the same name as me and all.

I didn't have a clue what was going on.

lkionm

lahalane wrote: »

I don't know how to benefit from having someones email address...I'm more of a fapper. I like to tell everyone available in the fap victims chat that I lost my phone and to ring it so I can find it.

Me too.

Gummy Panda

danniemcq wrote: »

did the email address have a . in it, like firstname.lastname@hotmail.com or name.1234@hotmail.com

NEVER use . in email addresses it messes with the account and emails and stuff can go to the wrong people

Some stupid American bint keeps doing that with my email address. I keep getting mails from some high school about dances with horses

Cody Pomeray

danniemcq wrote: »

NEVER use . in email addresses it messes with the account and emails and stuff can go to the wrong people

because of human error, or something technical?

Icaras

Pageant Messiah wrote: »

loads of photos (some as she put it racy which she was appalled at )

Link?

Rented Mule

Pageant Messiah wrote: »

(some as she put it racy which she was appalled at )

One of the danger of registering as cumguzzler69@hotmail.com

danniemcq

Cody Pomeray wrote: »

because of human error, or something technical?

technical and human errors, it works a bit like a plus symbol when for example your email is username@gmail.com you can use username+boardsie@gmail.com when registering with something like boards.ie and use the filters to auto sort anything that is sent to your email from boards by filtering for the address username+boardsie@gmail.com

does that make sense?

there is a thread here that kinda deals with it here

http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/gmail/nWLQfavNdKs%5B1-25-false%5D

Hownowcow

Gummy Panda wrote: »

Some stupid American bint keeps doing that with my email address. I keep getting mails from some high school about dances with horses

What?

A0

Pageant Messiah wrote: »

What's the worst you could do with the information ? (not that you would of course !!!)

Your mum is going to be stalked, surely stalker faces will appear on her PC screen. Quite scary. I'd say ring facebook.