Cant stop the recent increase in spam

[zippy1148]

A few months ago, all my family email addreses got a sudden increase in spam.

The emails all have similar titles, about having won a prize or Mcaffee subcription expired etc, but the sender address changes for each email.

My actions so far has been to:

Mark them as Spam, never open or view them, Unticked externally linked images.

Forward them to phishing@talktalk.co.uk

I rang talktalk and was directed to forward the full header source.

I was sending about 10 per day for a week to talktalk but no change. (annoyingly I was blocked/limited from sending more per day because it was picking me up a spamming talktalk!)

I again rang and was basically told there are aware of the issue but because the emails are not coming from a talktalk email address, there is nothing they can do.

Really? Your spam filtering has been quite good up to then, and I have waited a few months for you to work on it but am now on the verge of leaving talktalk.

[Gondola]

We have seen an increase in spam activity but it's not just limited to TalkTalk Mail.

TalkTalk do block millions of spam messages each day but as spammers change sending addresses / techniques regularly it's inevitable that some are delivered. One common factor is that your family addresses got an increase in delivered spam at around the same time. So, it's best to be suspicious on how all addresses become known to a potential new wave of spammers. Marking as Spam in webmail is the accepted reporting method that alerts the CloudMark spam fingerprinting engine to get into action.

If there truly are no common factors then CloudMark hasn't got a hope in fingerprinting spam. So, if you've identified no common factors at all and each spam email is unique then it's not a surprise that the first of a kind does get through. I'm sure I could see potential common factors to detect either in the header or body content. You have said they have similar titles.

 Report a phishing or spam email

[zippy1148]

Hi @Gondola ,

Thanks for the suggestions.

I have numerous security programs and have run them all  for password capturing virus, trojan or other malware etc.

Having contacted friends in our address book, none of them are receiving similar spam. Internet searches highlight a number of talktalk customers have experience a similar surge over the last 2 mths.

There is no common factors to apply a filter, and it would be impractical to try and create a safe list.

[Gondola]

Spammers discovering all your family email addresses at the same time suggests that an email account has been compromised and the addresses obtained from an Address Book or group email.

The compromised account is likely to be any one (family or other) that shares all addresses being spammed.

It is therefore recommended to scan all devices for password capturing virus, trojan or other malware and then as a precaution to upgrade passwords.

Now that spammers know the addresses it's a relentless task to eliminate spam. Spammers change sending addresses and techniques to circumvent blocking and fingerprinting of spam.

Having inspected the header of the spam mail do you see any common factor in the Return-Path or From lines? A filter rule could be set to act on a common factor unique to the spam but not genuine emails.

If using Outlook you could set Safe Sender Lists up to accept to the Inbox only those messages from known recipients.