Re: OT gmail alert -- spam or real?

Others,
Seems to me that some people DO need an effective AV/Phish solution.
The malware infects their brains, especially if they had to ask the
question Jackson Byers asked.

Jackson,
Simply look at the headers of the message. Look at what it is asking
you. The "security upgrade" scheme is old in Internet years. These
days it's more a joke than anything else.

Learn to read the "received-from: " headers on the email. It would also
help to learn the meaning of the rest of the headers. But, the primary
good thing to learn is that the likelihood of ANY reputable company
asking for information this way is so close to zero it's safe to discard
the message.

The usual technique for this kind of change is similar to what Yahoo
did when they found good reason to update their database. When I went
to log in it asked for new security information with revised reminder
questions. Email would be too cumbersome, too likely to be spam canned,
and too easy to forge and sucker in gullible people. Just toss it
Jackson. Then see if you can avail yourself of some of the expertise
here off-line for help learning to read email headers at a cursory
level and why. Approached nicely folks here do answer.

{^_^}
----- Original Message -----
From: "jackson byers" <byersjab@xxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, 2010/May/06 10:49


I don't know how to tell whether the below quoted email is really from
gmail or some sort of spam/scan. I don't recall ever giving my birthdate
to gmail before, or having to put in my password except when starting
gmail. .....?
Any other users on this list seeing this?

thanks for advice
Jack

from Gmail Support <useralert00@xxxxxxxxx>
to
date Sun, May 2, 2010 at 7:19 PM
subject ALERT: Act Fast!
mailed-by gmail.com
signed-by gmail.com
hide details May 2 (4 days ago)
Gmail Team is working on total security on all accounts and as a
result of this security upgrade we require all Google members to
verify their account with Google. To prevent your account from
disability you will have to update your information by clicking the
reply button and filling the space below.

Account:
Password:
Birth date:
Country:
Warning!!! Account owner that refuses to update his or her account
within Seven days of receiving this warning will lose his or her
account permanently.
Thank you for using Gmail!

The Gmail Team

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