Checking my primary Gmail-account this morning, I found that it had been inundated by spam overnight. Annoying as this is, I didn't think it was too much of a problem; I just deleted and then deleted forever all 3 pages of spam. However, it then became apparent that I had another, more serious problem -- I no longer had any messages in my Inbox dating from after Jan 29th, 2010. In other words, I had lost a whole year's worth of correspondence, or in Gmail speak, conversations. Which wouldn't be so bad if had just been private e-mail back and forth; but included in these missing messages were my applications and all the replies I had received to them in the past 7 months...and I need (a record of) these in order to continue to qualify for unemployment benefit. Luckily, I have kept some in hardcopy, but not all...
I followed Google's advice to troubleshoot and try and retrieve my messages. I found there had been suspicious activity on my account from an unknown IP-address (206.124.112.22) which according to the results of an Internet search belongs to the Visto Corporation in Redwood City, CA, USA -- and that, probably as a direct result, my messages had been irretrievably deleted.
ETA: Curiouser and curiouser...
"Company Overview
Visto Corporation provides mobile messaging services for mobile operators. It offers Visto Mobile, a platform for mobile service providers to deliver push email, calendar, contacts, and various corporate data to a set of devices; and Visto open solution, which enables email for the mass business market. The company also provides Visto Mobile Internet Edition, which provides mobile push emails for up to five Internet email accounts; Visto Mobile Personal Edition, which is designed for individuals and small groups, offices, and departments with less than five people; and Visto Mobile Enterprise Edition, which is used in larger organizations and allows information technology managers to install..."
Does that sound like they could be spammers? Or are they more likely to be just another link in the chain?
I followed Google's advice to troubleshoot and try and retrieve my messages. I found there had been suspicious activity on my account from an unknown IP-address (206.124.112.22) which according to the results of an Internet search belongs to the Visto Corporation in Redwood City, CA, USA -- and that, probably as a direct result, my messages had been irretrievably deleted.
ETA: Curiouser and curiouser...
"Company Overview
Visto Corporation provides mobile messaging services for mobile operators. It offers Visto Mobile, a platform for mobile service providers to deliver push email, calendar, contacts, and various corporate data to a set of devices; and Visto open solution, which enables email for the mass business market. The company also provides Visto Mobile Internet Edition, which provides mobile push emails for up to five Internet email accounts; Visto Mobile Personal Edition, which is designed for individuals and small groups, offices, and departments with less than five people; and Visto Mobile Enterprise Edition, which is used in larger organizations and allows information technology managers to install..."
Does that sound like they could be spammers? Or are they more likely to be just another link in the chain?
- Current Mood:
stressed
Comments
And yeah, the spam numbers at the moment are pretty high. :P
Sorry about all your mail - I hope it magically reappears. (do gmail have backup servers?)
I think deep down we're all afraid that the technology we so depend on and love will bite us in the bum.