sartan

A friend of mine has an ex-boyfriend who has hacked into her yahoo mail. She knows he has because she found it on his computer. I was wondering if anyone knows if any kind of legal action can be taken or atleast point me in the direction to get some answers. Any help would be deeply appreciated. Thanks

sartan

I posted this in the computer section but I thought I might get a quicker answer here - mods feel free to delete.

A friend of mine has an ex-boyfriend who has hacked into her yahoo mail. She knows he has because she found it on his computer. I was wondering if anyone knows if any kind of legal action can be taken or atleast point me in the direction to get some answers. Any help would be deeply appreciated. Thanks

User Name

Hacked? Are you sure that he simply didn't know the password?

nothingx

Did he use the information obtained to do anything illegal? Was there a loss of money involved? Unless you can find something like that, no, there is nothing that can be done. Email is insecure. Anyone listening to the network at the right time can see anything you send over email. Admins that run Yahoo can read her email.

Tell her to change her password, maybe even get a new email address. If her business needs privacy, concider using encryption or other means of communication.

By the way, its somewhat difficult to "hack" a Yahoo password. She probably gave her password to him and forgot about it, or didn't realize it. Might not have been a problem if she changed it every month like she should've.

sartan

I'm not positive but she said she asked him and he told her that he doesn't know her password and that he "got a friend to hack into her e-mail"

Manic_Skafe

If she accesed her account on his computer then she probably didn't erase her password and account name so he just signed back onto her account with the information she neglected to erase.You'd be surprised how many people toss around the word "hacked' without having hacked anything.

As for legal action, depending upon where you are, I'm sure she could do something but that's far too much work.

If he actually did have someone hack her account I suggest she get another account and not give it out to anyone except people she trusts.

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Church

Besides the fact that Yahoo mail accounts are VERY unprotected (and that's all I'm saying on that subject), she really can't take any legal action. Its a free service, and the judge, if it gets that far, would just laugh at her. Just make a new email account.

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Craven Morehead

Or just tell her to change her password.

Peetster

Merged with the thread started in Computers. I left it in GD because it is a more general discussion about legal ramifications of password loss than a specific computer issue.

nanofever

Five dollars says one of two things happened...

One, she opened an attachment or went to a site and had a keylogger installed on her machine.

Two, she went to a site she believed was yahoo e-mail but it was infact a fake site to record her password.

Other (less likely) possibilities include yahoo saving her password in a cookie, and a packsniffer on her computer and her password being sent out unencrypted.

/these assume she was actually hacked and not that she forgot to log out.

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denim

Using a free e-mail account is just asking for this kind of thing, anyway. Yahoo, hotmail, gmail, others: if you want someone to care, get a real e-mail account.

Xell101

What kind of legal actions and for what?

SaltPork

So the creepy guy got into her email account, it's not like he broke into her apartment and took stuff. New email or password and everything will be fine. What opportunity did she have to see the email on his computer? Why was she on his computer to begin with? What type of relationship do/did they have as a couple? Did she ever use his computer to check her email? Did he ever use her account for anything? What was their agreement with regard to the use of the account if there was such an agreement in place? What damage was done to her as a result of him seeing the emails?

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Asuka{eve}

You can close a yahoo account.

dieseldog

Just change the password?

tecoyah

Tell her to start a new E-mail account. Then find the nastiest of viruses, and send it to the old account.....that'll learn 'im.

Beats the hell outa lawyers fees.

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p0thead

you cant sue the ex-bf... i seriously doubt he got a friend to hack her yahoo account, she probably either gave him the PW, he saw her typing the PW (most likely), or guessed her password if he knew her well enough. some ppl like to use the same password for everything and through trial and error, it isnt hard to guess someone's password if you know them well enough.

i seriously doubt the police would do anything over a few emails that were read, unless he bought things with her email account, private information and address but that would fall under identity theft.

animosity

It is not hard to get someones email password. Im sure she just has an easy password or if the guy is sneaky he could have sent an email that redirects to a mirror login site(that is what would do) so she would type her password in there.

The simple explanation is usually the correct one.... He just guessed it.

rmarshall

Sometimes it's way too easy to get into an email account. I had a friend who wanted to read her sister's email. There was a button called "Forgot your password?". If you press it, it gives you a hint. In my friend's sister's case, the hint was "shuttle". It didn't take me more than a second to remember the must famous shuttle was "challenger". Bingo! That was the password.

Moral of the story: Don't make the password hints so easy that anybody would be able to guess.