There is an email in circulation which offers 778,000 Paypal and eGold users' email addresses for sale...

This email is not a spoof as our other examples are, but it does lead to a web page (no, not a forged one) which has an advertisement for the purchase of 778,000 email addresses which are advertised as belonging to Paypal and eGold users.

We have withheld the URL of the page in question (for obvious reasons), but we found that it resolved to Russian web space (hosted by webrider.ru) which is a frequent thing amongst Phishing Scams. In our investigation, we noticed a huge jump in readership levels (source: Alexa.com) during the period that this email was in circulation, and during the middle of February. The web site predominantly advertises web hosting solutions.

We did initially see this as a scam likely to take money from those who would fall over themselves to own such a huge list of these sites' users (such as Phisher's and Spammers) and to supply a list of random email addresses if any at all.

However, we wondered ... if it is a con, why only claim to only have Paypal and eGold users' email addresses? Why not state so many thousands of eBay users as well? Seems odd that eBay user emails are only mentioned there by suggested joint use of the sites.

If the database of email addresses really does contain those of genuine Paypal and eGold users, there would be a big problem facing those people. With the complexity of phishing scams that are in circulation, they would be under very serious threat. As the email says, there is a huge majority of Paypal users who also use eBay with the same email address on their accounts.

If you are concerned by this potential threat (which would not be unreasonable), then change your email address with Paypal, eBay and eGold RIGHT NOW.

As a user of either site, take the cautious approach and assume the worst - treat all email purporting to come from either site with suspicion: never use a link in any email to access a site and only enter a site by manually typing the URL directly into your browser address bar. Make sure that you have up to date Anti Virus, Firewall and Spyware Scanner software installed and that they are updated daily.

The Email ...

Hello:

We are offering 2 email databases which allow to contact PayPal and e-Gold customers (both sellers and shoppers).
These are individuals that buy and sell items using PayPal and e-Gold payment systems.
(Please notice that 90% of PayPal customers are also customers of eBay.)

These databases will be perfect for selling your products/services, because we are providing you unique prospects who purchase and sell online more than anybody else! Besides, the data provided contains personal email addresses of only those PayPal and e-Gold members who were active (purchased or sold something) in the last 2 months.

PayPal - 406,000 records
e-Gold - 372,000 records

The databases will be delivered to you in any format of your choice (Excel, ASCII, CSV, etc.).
By default they are provided in 4-6MB TXT files.
New updates will be released quarterly.

The total price we are asking for both databases is $365. To place the order please fill out the form:
http://www.xxxxxxx.com/paypal.php

To contact me please email to service@xxxxxxx.com (THIS EMAIL ONLY! DO NOT 'REPLY').

Please notice that we also maintain a variety of other b2b and b2c lists.

Best,
Tom Dullex

The web page advert (an extract of the web page - full page not shown)...