Extortion

[frequent]

Use some common sense when using the internet.

Surely even you know by now that there's nothing common about commonsense. It is in fact quite rare

[kittyboy]

The only question is where did they get my password from ?

Thankfully that password will be no use at all for getting into any serious sites.

I recall that some of the large security breaches that have occurred over the last few years included login information - IDs AND passwords - that may be how your password was obtained.

It might be that information is being sold or traded online. It is only a guess - our resident IT security expert might have a better informed understanding of how scammers can obtain passwords.

[kittyboy]

Surely even you know by now that there's nothing common about commonsense. It is in fact quite rare

Frequent - I take a more charitable view of human beings.
At some level we all have common sense - it we did not we would run out in traffic, be poor after giving our money away in scams, and generally be stupid screw ups all the time.
Most people screw up some of the time..lose focus..and do stupid things in the moment.
IMHO - Common sense is pretty common but when it fails..it sometimes fails in spectacular ways which we remember vividly - we tend to forget the basic common sense that most of us employ to survive in our everyday lives.... Having said that I have met some people who I do wonder how they survive as they do seem basically lacking in common sense...they are just plain stupid.

[scottish-guy]

I think Kittyboy is correct but would only add that the one sure way of making almost any guy lose all common sense whatsoever is to introduce sex into the equation

[paborn]

Frequent - I take a more charitable view of human beings.
At some level we all have common sense - it we did not we would run out in traffic, be poor after giving our money away in scams, and generally be stupid screw ups all the time.
Most people screw up some of the time..lose focus..and do stupid things in the moment.
IMHO - Common sense is pretty common but when it fails..it sometimes fails in spectacular ways which we remember vividly - we tend to forget the basic common sense that most of us employ to survive in our everyday lives.... Having said that I have met some people who I do wonder how they survive as they do seem basically lacking in common sense...they are just plain stupid.

I agree with most of this but he is would not, necessarily, be stupid. When Einstein was at Princeton students took care to watch out for him. He could not be trustede to cross the street - head in the clouds/

[christianpfc]

I would be interested to know if anyone else has had a similar attempt ?

No. Only well-known scams from Nigeria and pregnancy miracle.

[goji]

This is basic 101 stuff guys.

Don't jump on your soapbox & assume we have screwed up big time here.
Just to be clear, I have a completely different password regime and different e-mail accounts according to the level of the site accessed.

What has been compromised is a second tier e-mail, not used for anything serious & a password which may have been common to a few non-critical websites. Including this one, until yesterday.

If anyone had compromised my PC via keylogger software, I would expect them to go after some more lucrative opportunities. So it seems more likely that a website has had a security breach.

[paborn]

exactly!

[frequent]

I agree with most of this but he is would not, necessarily, be stupid. When Einstein was at Princeton students took care to watch out for him. He could not be trustede to cross the street - head in the clouds/

Evidently kittyboy has a different view of commonsense than me. I wouldn't have read his response had you not quoted it paborn as he is another tiresome poster I have in my Ignore list

[kittyboy]

Evidently kittyboy has a different view of commonsense than me. I wouldn't have read his response had you not quoted it paborn as he is another tiresome poster I have in my Ignore list

Ah... On someone's ignore list.
That is cute. I take it as a compliment.