Googlegroups scam? Or what?

January 14, 2009 7:11 AM

I just got this in my inbox from Google Groups. Is this some sort of scam or problem?

Hello,

I've added you to my gvxytifdc group at Yahoo! Groups, a free,
easy-to-use service. Yahoo! Groups makes it easy to send and receive
group messages, coordinate events, share photos and files, and more.


Description of the group:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
taavdrmrdmuuxyo

Complete your Yahoo! Groups account:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Your email address has been added to the email list of a Yahoo! Group.
To gain access to all of your group's web features (previous messages,
photos, files, calendar, etc.) and easier control of your message
delivery options, we highly recommend that you complete your account
by connecting your email address to a Yahoo account. It is easy and free.
Please visit:
http://groups.yahoo.com/convacct?email=sdflkjwenrlkjsdf%40gmail.com&list=gvxytifdc

Important information about the gvxytifdc group
------------------------------------------------------------------------


I was about to just unsubscribe from this-obviously this isn't a real group, right?-but then I thought maybe responding to this was not a good idea....so, other than delete this as junkmail, anything else I should be concerned about?

posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies to Computers & Internet (9 answers total)

I got it too, for what it's worth. I archived it in case I need the opt out info in the future, but assumed it's - like most evil spam - an attempt to make me click somewhere nasty.
posted by CunningLinguist at 7:33 AM on January 14, 2009

I checked - mine was the "vtfdxyjjpi group."
posted by CunningLinguist at 7:34 AM on January 14, 2009

I got a similar one about a week ago, but I have since noticed (when checking my spam bucket) that I am now getting emails from this 'fake' group.

I presume (although have been too lazy to do it) that if you log on to Yahoo you should be able to remove yourself from that group?
posted by unsliced at 7:53 AM on January 14, 2009

Its spam. I tried joining one of those once in order to find out what it was, only to find they had been taken down because it was a group for some kind of porn.
posted by Sakura3210 at 7:53 AM on January 14, 2009

Update: it is definitely spam. I logged into Yahoo Groups and removed myself from the last. Easy darts.
posted by unsliced at 8:00 AM on January 14, 2009

I get these all the time, but in my Yahoo email. Spam. Flag and ignore.
posted by desjardins at 10:10 AM on January 14, 2009

Response by poster: Thanks, everyone! Will mark as spam.
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 10:13 AM on January 14, 2009

Best answer: It's very important that you not actually click on the link provided in the email, but instead just go to Yahoo Groups yourself. If you click on the link in the email, it's very likely not Yahoo but a site that looks just like Yahoo (and probably uses various browser tricks to make it look as much like Yahoo as possible so even if you know what you're looking for it's very hard to tell that it's not the real Yahoo site), and if you log into that, you've just given away your Yahoo login and password. This is known as phishing. If you've done that, immediately go back to Yahoo by typing in the URL and change your passwords.

This is in the rules.
posted by Caviar at 7:17 AM on January 15, 2009

Response by poster: I think I just marked it as junk in gmail. Caviar, your point is exactly why I came here to ask the question-I just KNEW this was fishy. Thanks!
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 3:30 PM on January 16, 2009