ok 4 email accounts hacked...now what?

[violineb]

****ed doesn't really cut the description. On to the details>

Yesterday or was it before yesterday? (I'll get more exact details after I interrogate my family) My Dad tells me he's unable to log into his gmail or his msn. I didn't think much of this at first as once I had to login using the secured login and then it worked fine after I cleared some cookies. I tried it, no luck. Tried other computers. No luck. Now if that wasn't bad enough I get a call from my older sister's and her email accounts eborowsky at gmail & girlpianist at msn have been hacked and she's been locked out of them.

Strangely both my gmail and msn are fine. I went ahead and changed her paypal password that uses her msn email as well as some other passwords (school emails) But this seems pretty serious and I have no idea what to do or how this could happen. 4 accounts 4!!!!! All four account had the same password BUT some of them had capitalized first letters, so they weren't say...identical.

so what now? or any speculations as to how this could have happened? and lastly, can I be sure my dad and sister have been hacked?

confused,
Eman

time to go eat dinner but I figured i'd best first post on the forum I trust most.

[bchur83]

Sounds to me like they all were on an infected PC that had a keylogger on it and someone nicked their info.

[EmAn]

either that or you got attacked by an Anonymous member wanting some epic lulz!

but in short it may have been a key logger or someone did hack all four of your accounts

[TalRW]

Low chance of this but still possible. Are you running an unprotected wireless network. Someone could have used a packet sniffer on your network and stolen your passwords although if I was going to do that I'd personally go after more valuable data then someones MSN email.

Like I said low probability but still possible.

[EmAn]

hey i just noticed you mentioned me in your first post

[violineb]

Eman is my name, not yours :p Unless it is too? Hmm any more theories and solutions?

[Knacko]

It's not likely that two people would forget an identical password at the same time, so you can rule out human error. The e-mail accounts are also on different servers, so it isn't an external problem. The only thing left is they've been hacked through some form or another.

And what teenage/adult girl (no age given) would share a password with their Dad?

[coin]

This does sound like a keylogger on a shared machine or packet sniffing on a wireless network. The other possibility is that the shared password is a 'shared word' eg surname or street name. If the last is true then it is reasonably possible that someone could guess it with just a little work.
You don't say if your password is similar to theirs. If it is then it is less likely that someone has 'guessed' it.
You don't say if someone has used these email accounts? Is it not also possible that someone has tried to guess passwords and simply locked the accounts?

[Omsion]

Start using different passwords, I guess is the solution, then. And do make sure keyloggers/trojans are not laying around waiting for the next ambush victim =p

[systemhost]

Keylogger...