Obtain PayPal email account (illegally)

[Guest Meow Meow]

Hello -

One of my "potential suppliers" from overseas sent me a bill via Paypal before I provided that information, i.e. my PayPal email account; that took me by surprise to say the least. Does anyone know how did they do that? And, what can we do to prevent any risks associated with illegally obtained PayPal email accounts?

Of course, I have been drilling the vendor for the information but so far, I received the 'silent treatment'.

[Guest groovejuice]

It is likely something benign. Most sites use their PayPal primary address. So when a purchase is made, the confirmation email will be sent from that address. Make sure that your password has lots of characters that are alpha/numeric and not thematic -

like meow123. In a perfect world, PayPal would have a log-in that is not your email address. I guess they don't make enough profit to warrant beefing up the security protocols. :(

[jerseyjoe]

I suspect an even less ominous scenario, but one that still requires that your PP address is also your standard email address.

PP has a feature, visible onscreen in one of the tabs, "Request Money." They might have called it, "Send an Invoice" or "Send a Bill" but I guess their choice is a good one.

Were there a security breach, you wouldn't have gotten what is basically just a structured email, you would have had the funds removed from your account. I don't hear that anything like that has happened.

Hope that helps . . .

Joe

[goober999]

Hello -

One of my "potential suppliers" from overseas sent me a bill via Paypal before I provided that information, i.e. my PayPal email account; that took me by surprise to say the least. Does anyone know how did they do that? And, what can we do to prevent any risks associated with illegally obtained PayPal email accounts?

Of course, I have been drilling the vendor for the information but so far, I received the 'silent treatment'.

Hi,

There is nothing "illigal" about this. You can use PayPal to send an invoice to ANY email address, whether the email account is a paypal account or not. If you had any email communication with this vendor then they have your email account. All they did was send an invoice, perfectly valid, perfectly legal. If that account just happens to be your paypal account as well then that's just a coincidence.

NEVER give your passwords to anyone. Never click on any links that would take you to PayPal site to login. Always go to paypal site directly and login.

Thanks

/Goober

[Guest Meow Meow]

Hello -

One of my "potential suppliers" from overseas sent me a bill via Paypal before I provided that information, i.e. my PayPal email account; that took me by surprise to say the least. Does anyone know how did they do that? And, what can we do to prevent any risks associated with illegally obtained PayPal email accounts?

Of course, I have been drilling the vendor for the information but so far, I received the 'silent treatment'.

Hi,

There is nothing "illigal" about this. You can use PayPal to send an invoice to ANY email address, whether the email account is a paypal account or not. If you had any email communication with this vendor then they have your email account. All they did was send an invoice, perfectly valid, perfectly legal. If that account just happens to be your paypal account as well then that's just a coincidence.

NEVER give your passwords to anyone. Never click on any links that would take you to PayPal site to login. Always go to paypal site directly and login.

Thanks

/Goober

Ok, I perhaps was a little quick jumping to conclusion. Here are the facts...

1. My PayPal email account is completely different than what I use for purchases; therefore, even if you have my registered email - there is no way you would have known my Paypal email unless I specifically provided it to you.

2. The PayPal bill that I received had my "unpublished" PayPal email account, and that was shocking to me.

3. In regards to my Paypal security sign in info., I have approximately about 20 to 25 characters including uppercase, lowercase, and numbers in both email and password. (For security reasons, I only approximated the number of characters in my PayPal email and password account.)

4. I totally agree with you about the "phishing" thing, something that we should all be aware of.