I will be back soon with a lovely tale. However, I want to post some information here, that is very important to me regarding my e-mail address: VanessaValencia(at)aol.com has been seemingly stolen/copied, and is being used for yucky things. (final update in ps: section)
You see, some person/company/evil creatures on the other side of the globe stole or copied or somehow are using my e-mail address to spam the whole of the planet (it feels like it at least). I would personally never ever ever SPAM anyone anywhere, at any time.
For two days I have had more than 500 e-mails with the subject that the receiver is "blocking and or not accepting SPAM received by my e-mail address". WHAT#%&*? I didn't send anyone any spam!
Maybe some of you are experiencing this as well? Is your in-box all of a sudden full of this?
-> MAILER-DAEMON@… (that is just a handful of what my e-mail looks like)
I wish I knew what this meant??
I can't stand seeing my name affiliated with this… Oh and, who is Suzanna Curtis, see below?
I personally find this very disturbing. And, apparently, there is nothing a person can do about it. So, I want to make it clear through this post that VanessaValencia(at)aol.com is being used unbeknownst to the e-mail owner to send spam to places all over the world. I do not condone this behavior and Vanessa Valencia herself is not sending spam.
This is how I felt yesterday. Ugly right?
Luckily Mister Lovee happily serves as my personal human resources center 😉 – Oh and, it is happening to him as well on his own laptop at his office. He uses Yahoo mail…
So, I am much better today regarding the issue. But I find it all very scary. Makes me want to move to a cabin in the woods with no internet service…
I spoke to someone yesterday who knows about these things, and was advised to not let it bother me, and eventually it would subside, because there is nothing I can do…
Scary.
Panic.
I wasn't even going to bring this up, but another day of it is a little much, even for me.
Vanessa Valencia detests SPAM.
Don't you?
I have rarely if ever even sent an e-mail to a group of people. And I never send bulk e-mail.
I barely know how to answer one person at a time ;) I have changed my password several times and cleared my cache and even turned off my computer and unplugged my modem for a day, just in case….
But what I heard is that these spammers get lists of our e-mails addresses and somehow copy them and use them as the sender's address. I am not sure. I don't really understand it.
But I know I don't like it ~
And mostly, it's just annoying.
Tell me I am not alone in this……… Pwease?
🖤 ,V
ps: I totally understand that this isn't important in the grand scheme of life, at all. But I wanted to have a place where I could voice myself. In my opinion, this is the part of the story where we have to cross the stinky swamp, filled with pie-throwing goblins, in our own life fairytale 😉
pss: I am not changing my e-mail address because of this, so if you need to get a hold of me, feel free to e-mail me at VanessaValencia(at)aol.com. I have had this e-mail address for 15+ years and will keep it ;)
Thank you for being such wonderful folks!!
psss: My own conclusion about what is happening in this case is that these spammers are using our e-mail addresses as the return address, but not actually getting into our computers per se.
So my take is, it's like if I sent a real life snail mail package to every single one of you and put down Madonna's address as the return address. Then you receive the package, and since it looks suspicious (because why would Madonna be sending you a package?), you "return to sender" where by then, Madonna gets a whole lot of returned packages that she never sent…
That's my analogy 😉 I could be wrong, but that is my peace with it. Next…. 😉
Final Pssss:
Hi there! Thank you for being so super supportive and kind and sharing words of advice. I wanted to let you know what I found out on my end. Maybe it will help you?
Oh my goodness, is that what is going on? I have gotten a bunch of those too and I just thought it was someone spamming me and I’ve been hitting delete! Oh no…I hope people don’t think I am spamming them too. What in the world is going on 🙁 That stinks V! Well, big hugs to make you feel all better 😉
Jamie 🙂
p.s. I got Remi Lovelots yesterday and she is just lovely lovely lovely…thank you so much!! She has joined her little elfin family and they are all so cute together, tee hee. Now, I might have to lock them up so my girls don’t steal them 😉
Jamie 🙂
I am so sorry Vanessa, what a yucky feeling. hang in there, this too shall pass.
much love
~karin
oh, I’m sorry to hear this! I cannot understand why they do this? I hope it gets solved soon!
I had something like this happen last week. This is what I concurred happened. When I sent out my e-mail notifying my “blog fans” of a new post, I did a blind CC, like I always do, but I did not put my name at the top where it says TO. Also, my subject was “paper art Dolls,” which could be interpreted in other ways-maybe girlie sites? I went back and changed the subject to read something other than dolls and I put my name in and it solved my problem…That is all that I can offer on this. Hope it helps!
This just happened with my email address too, I know how you feel. 🙁 I just changed my password and it seemed to stop.
One of my Flickr friends had her account name stolen and used to send out yucky spam. It wasn’t her regular email , but I didn’t pay attention and opened it anyway. I let her know and apparently she was able to straighten it out with Yahoo.
And another artist whose blog I follow is having problem with AOL, too!
What scumbags these spammers are!!!
Keep your chin up, Miss V.~~we love you :~)
what an annoying hassle. I hope it ends soon for you 🙂
Oh Vanessa, I am so sorry… there are such terrible people out there to do something like this to you! I wish you could conjure up a magic potion and make them go away! I do hope things get better soon… I know you would never, ever send out bad things! xoxo Julie Marie
Oh Vanessa this is horrible. I can understand why you’d find it upsetting…know I’d be quite distraught. Just don’t understand how it’s possible for somebody to do this…but then I’m not a computer geek…and I can’t understand why your service provider can’t do something about it. Hope it gets cleared up soon…
How awful! I wonder if – since it happened to your Mr. Lovee as well – if perhaps it’s AOL addresses that have been hacked into? Either way, so sorry that’s happened to you. I’ve always wondered what the point of spamming was – does anyone really read those icky things? I guess someone must or why would they do it…Hope you can get the graffiti off your mailbox soon!
(I came by to see if you’d seen ‘Alice’ yet – perhaps that would be a good antidote to the ‘poison pen letters’ bit!).
I hate spam, this has happened to me, and it does subside. It is a horrible feeling {empty pit in the stomach} when it first happens. I am sorry to know that there are parts of the world where Kathy must be a male name, because I get more spam about ED than anything else!
You are not the only one. It happened to me too and eventually they stopped. Changing the password does not help because they are not actually using your mailbox…I don’t understand it either, but they don’t get your mail and cannot get in. So just delete and forget…it will stop eventually. I almost deleted my mail account and was so glad I did not, for I had lost track of a dear friend out of state several years ago and couldn’t locate her, when just this Christmas her daughter was going through her Christmas belongings and found my email address and wrote to let me know that my friend had died several years ago, which is why I lost track of her. I am SO glad I kept my original email address. So just hang in there. When you hit delete, deleted it from your mind too. **happy smiles** Deb
I think this one is fairly harmless. I had my online bank details stolen which wasn’t funny… then on my other bank account a charge has appeared for a £200 phone call which certainly wasn’t me and the bank sure are taking their time investigating that one. My Facebook account sent everyone invitations to a very rude site so someone had hacked that too. Sometimes I feel very vulnerable!
Oh Vanessa, I am so sorry to hear about this and I am a wee bit freaked out as well, as too be honest I am not really computer friendly. What I mean is I am friendly, the computer is not! I dont think I would even know if I was getting these emails! But I will keep a look out now, thanks for opening my eyes a bit! The web is a brilliant place but like all adventures, there are scary places too! It scares me at times!I am scared of clicking a wrong button or something! I have to confess, I am really a very bad lurker on your beautiful blog and I never commented before,(apart from the fantastic halloween party last year!) but I just thought I would let you know I am here sometimes, reading your lovely posts, thank you for inspiring me all the time! I think you are FAB! Here’s to brighter days! All the best!
Miss Deborah, I TOTALLY agree!!!! Delete delete 😉
You know what else? I really wanted to post about this to chronicle
that I am not the spammer. You wont believe this, a man e-mailed me on
Sunday asking me why I am harassing him with so much SPAM…. I felt
awful…….. poor man….. It wasn’t me spamming him, of course.
Let’s all hold hands and get across the stinky swamp together so that we can play. I hate this stuff, too and appreciate you telling us! We can be on the lookout for the stinky monster! EEEE!!! Take care! We love you! 🖤🖤🖤
super annoying 🙁 🙁 🙁
Don’t you hate it when something out of your control somehow makes you feel like the bad guy even though you didn’t do anything?
Dear Vanesa, I can not believe it!!!
Of course I understand you when yo say it´s horrible!!!
Well be patient with this 🙁
I send you a ton of kisses Plink!
Good Grief!
Why are there people out there that do such things!!!
I know I just joined a new doll ning group and I immediately started getting mail from some person named ‘TAMMY’ that I don’t even know and she sneakily ‘acquired’ my email address and now I am getting tons of ‘advertising’ emails from her and I have to delete about thirty of them a day. But what you are experiencing sounds like piracy. To bad there isn’t something like email fraud like the Post Office has ‘mail fraud.’ Maybe there is, but I wouldn’t have a clue as to how to go about prosecuting the offender. It is just plain ridiculous. Why would anyone want to do such a thing in the first place? I guess there are ‘wackos’ out there who are sent from some demon world to annoy those of us who just want to mind our own business. I thought if an email address was already set up it couldn’t be used by someone else.
But it looks like they ‘redirected’ your email address somehow.
I am sending up an Arrrgh! for your frustration.
Pray that the person’s computer blows up!
Maybe that will work!
I had this happen to me several years ago, and, once I changed my password, I didn’t have anymore problems. It was really frustrating and disturbing when it happened to me. I hope it all gets straightened out soon.
Dear Vanessa
Please do not panic. This is unbelievably common – in some ways it’s astonishing its taken so long for your email to be affected. There really isn’t anything much you can do about it but don’t worry that people will think you’re genuinely now selling Viagra or whatever!
I agree….let it go….I’m sure the people that recognize your name will know it’s spam from some unidentified source. It’s good you posted about it here tho. A friend of my son’s had that happen to him….a psycho girlfriend. There are crazy people out there!People can get an email under any name!
I am so sorry…rotten ppl, who are lazy and need a hobby or job.
xoxoxoxo
This started with my email so long ago I can’t remember. I contacted my host and they said it just happens and nobody can do anything about it. I don’t think it has stopped, but it has become part of life. All those mailer-damon emails go to my trash and I carry on. Stinks, huh? Some people are just … nasty, and I don’t know why they do what they do.
Hi Vanessa,
This happened to Me a few months ago..They even erased all of my contacts….It was SO Upsetting! I was able to talk to someone at Yahoo who talked me through what to do. Change of password etc. and told me how to get all My Friends back. Hope your problem is resolved soon!!
Trish
Dear Vanessa,
I can understand how you feel…
Because I have received spam emails from “friends”…
And I should say, from people who are not my friends but used their account to send out garbage…
Of course I did know immediately that someone was impersonating them as they would never send me those type of messages.
Do not feel alone, it is happening…
I have hesitated to email you to this email account, are you still using it?
You know I like to keep in touch from time to time…
Keep your nose up!
~ Gabriela ~
So sorry, Vanessa.
Hackers and spammers make me so mad I could spit!
I feel really sorry for what happened..:(
But don’t worry, you are not the only one which this has happened to!
So…will you still use your “vanessavalencia@aol.com” address? If not, please share your new e-mail with us!! 🙂
Hey V~
This sucks the big one I tell ya!
I loved the image of the stinky swamp and pie throwing goblins tho! Perhaps you could do an art piece out of it, and turn lemons into lemonade!
I had my credit card number stolen online a few months ago. There were even charges from Luxumberg!(SP?) Luckily my credit card company contacted me because it seemed unlike my usual spending pattern. They sent me a new card, and they also didn’t charge me. Now I am a lot more careful about where I use my card online.
It really bums me out that this sort of thing goes on. Those folks are so very lost, and deserve our pity and our prayers. They have yucky karma coming, if that’s any consolation. They should all be lined up against a wall and pummeled with poo pies by stinky swamp dwelling goblins!
Now that I’d love to see! ;)~M
Ohh no Vanessa, I cant stand this stuff. my poor mother has had to throw out her entire computer brain and start again because some lovely person tricked her into opening up the floodgates of yuckyness, you can imagine her poor face when she turned on her computer and had someones privates thrust at her!! hehe
And you are right to be worried about the grand scheme of things. When your a person (like me) who prefers to live in a private physical world but put yourself out there publicly on the net to connect, work, socialise and share and have that part of our lives threatened by something that can ruin all you have worked for. Your feelings are very warranted.
Good on you for keeping your address and working thru it, Im glad you have made me aware so I can be prepared if they come my way!
Ggggrrrr mean computer nasties
Yeah somedays I think the time I spent living in my caravan with no power and water were too delightful for words, but then I wouldnt know all you people would I .
much love to you
much power faliures to the computer hackers
sheree xxx
Oh my goodness! I am listening to Madonna RIGHT NOW. Can YOU believe that?! Well. Um, this very thing just happened to some good friends of mine, and they decided to just up and change their email instead…I just don’t understand all this who-ha. I mean, how can someone just take your email address and use it? I haven’t gotten anything suspicious from you…although, I know this kind of stuff goes on from time to time…and I also know how lovely you write in email and I would just be sitting here raising my eyebrows if I got something fishy from you. So there. Horrible email goblins. Really…
Oh Dear Beloved Fanciful friendling of the most excellent kind!! I too have had my email hacked and sent to my own place of work. When my co-worker saw it was from me she opened it and gasped with horror. What she saw was not a pretty sight…no not pretty at all!!!
Just delete those damon-mailers and move on…have a slice of pie or a piece of taffy. Oh, does the outside wall of the studio need painting? Take your angst out on it. Who knows you may create a masterpiece ;-).
Oohhh!!! Have you seen the new Alice? Lovely, simply lovely.
I do hope your email resolves itself very soon.
Happy little fuzzy thoughts are being directed your way ;-).
xoxo cori
PS,
Do you have a date for the new Mad Tea Party? I haven’t seen one of your delightful buttons to post on my blog ;-).
Oh no :((
I hope it stops. Where’s the internet police when we need them?!
you are not alone – it happened to me awhile ago, and the bounced emails stopped after a day or two. no need to change your address. sorry it happened to you.
That is so awful! Sometimes bad things happen for no good reason. It certainly is a mystery, must indeed be goblins!
I hope it clears up for you, I know you’d never spam. ‘Cause every email I have ever received from you is nothing but sweet and filled with fairy magic 🙂
So sorry to hear about your e-mail trauma.
I hope it clears up soon.
Well that just sucks! I had some issues during OWOH as you can imagine with over a 1,000 emails flying back and forth. I was getting those messages saying they’d been trying to send but failed…but they were to people I didn’t email. It DID stop if that’s any consolation but I know how completely aggravating something like this can be. It just infuriates me that people use their computer skills for evil rather than good.
Hang in there my friend, this too shall pass.
XOXOXO
So Sorry Vanessa! A friend of mine says that when weird things like that happen, little men with hard hats and hammers have invaded the computer somehow. They live inside our computers and create havoc…thus enabling open doors to hackers and such. I would never think that you would send any spam…you are just the sweetest!
xoxo,
Dena
sorry to hear about your email. bummer. love the drawing of the crying woman tho.
AGGHHH!!!
I hear your pain!
last week
somehow
a “security system…for just$49.95” got through and uninstalled some of my anti-virus program and LORDY was I fit to be tied! I did get it fixed, it wasn’t a virus, but I did read earlier that day that I had a foreign comment on one of my posts and instead of rejecting it I let it post
(I mean, MAYBE someone in china read my blog, right?)
and then I thought better of it….i think that’s how it got through.
the stress of dealing with it all jsut about made me want to inflict serious pain on someone….good thing hubs was working in his shop and not in the house while i got it fixed!
going to change my password now!
Well Miss Madonna…welcome to the 21st Century! 😉
It’s horrid, but it happens. I don’t think that with today’s technology that we will ever be able to stay one step ahead of the bad guys, ya know?
Anyone who knows you would know in a second that you would never “spam” anyone. Do not fret my friend, as others have said, this too shall pass! <3
Just thinking about you...and when I do, I always smile!
I don’t use the address book in my yahoo account, but my husband does and one time, somehow, someone got all her business/personal addresses and sent an email out, with his name at the bottom, saying that he was stuck in some country with no wallet, no money and needed help. Of course, he started to receive calls from business associates from Spain, Holland, etc, wanting to know if he was okay. I don’t understand how it happens either. I’ve never heard of someone using the email address for spam purposes. How does it benefit them if you are getting all the returned emails? Very strange inded! It can seem undoing at the time, but this too shall pass. Sending many blessings your way for a bright and beautiful day! 🙂 Tammy
I’m not sure, but it seems that you and Mr Lovee have caught a virus… You should install an antivirus (some are free and you can download them on the web – like CLAM or AVG) and clean your computers. You should also install a spyware. And, very important: you should create in your address book an adress beginning by 00 because this type of virus exploits your address book to spill more virus. Because this addy is false and is the first one, the virus who “works” alphabetically will be blocked at this one and so will stop there.
And you should use Thunderbird as mail reader… it’s more reliable against those weird things. Hope this helps…
I’m very sorry for you.
hey that was really nice, I was looking for something like this..I will defintely tweet about this wonderful blog..thanks for the post.
you are not alone dear!!! this happened to me last year or the year before. i got over 1000 emails bouncing back at me in my inbox, same thing. emails that “i” had sent. apparently there’s nothing you can do, they can “shadow” you or something. It’s no that there’s someone out there looking to see whose address they can steal, it’s all the workings of those spambots, all automated and totally frustrating! i had to close my website email address because of spam. then it happened with my ISP email, like your AOL one. but then, it disappeared, and never happened again, knock on wood! xo
Aaaah sweet one I have had this problem with my address too… fear not… you can do a little something about it… it wont completely alleviate the problem but it will help slightly… so here goes… take a few of these emails you are getting and forward them to TOSREPORTS@AOL.COM… Write them a little note to tell them what is happening and that you are getting oodles and oodles of these awful emails… this way should someone complain your email address wont be blocked by AOL itself so that you cant use your address anymore… then just start deleting them… do not let them go to your spam folder or you might end up not being able to use your address… I used to get tons of these… and when I did I would forward them to AOL constantly … they can sometimes catch who is doing it and notify the person that if they dont stop they will prosecute them… (they can sometimes trace the source ) … it may not eliminate all of your ickies but it will help … do not fear because it will take some time… be sure patience is one of your virtues… as I know you have many!!
LOTS AND LOTS OF HUGS
JO
Sorry this has happened Vanessa. This is one of the problems that we face when we put ourselves online and open to everyone though. Since I started blogging I’ve made so many friends who are honest and kind, but there will always be the odd stranger who won’t be.
It’s hard to understand how they can do it, when we know we wouldn’t ourselves.
I hope you get it sorted soon, and don’t let it ruin your time on here. We all love your blog posts.
Oh, my Alice postcards arrived safely and are fabulous btw. Thank you!
Yep, this has happened to me, so I feel your pain. I had an internet friend who had it happen really bad to her, people were using her email address to ask those of us in her address book for money by sending a slightly legitimate sounding email out. She had to keep responding to all these emails back to her asking what was going on. I felt so sorry for her, and I do for you as well. It will pass, but in the meantime it is annoying as hell.c
Hi Vanessa, I’m so sorry to hear about all this. It’s annoying and rather disturbing at the same time to think that people actually do this kind of thing. If it makes you feel a wee bit better, I have received nothing like that coming from your email address! Whatever has gotten through to be has been authentic Vanessa goodness!!! I have been getting unusual emails lately from folks claiming I’ve come into inheritances and a host of other odd things – like I’ve won the Australian lottery! LOL I just hit “delete.”
I would feel the same as you about all of this…please keep that sunny smile on and try not to worry much. It’s important to keep your muchness!!!
Theresa
I had this very thing. What stopped it for me was changing the password. whatever bot is using your email won’t have the new password. it worked for me anyway. my puter tech guy told me to do it that way. the mailer-daemon stuff stopped immediately! try it. hope it works for yiu too!
oh my dear vanessa! now i see! i have been waiting [by e-mail] for your opinion about my blog since the 13th of february!
now i know what happened with your e-mail!
and i was so disappointed…
Oh no, I am so sorry this happened to you! I hope it’s over soon, that is the worst feeling.
Eeeeek! how horrible! I’m ever so sorry your going through such a hard time with all this mess! I hope it all gets mended asap!! Perhaps AOL can do something to help!?? (But, I’m sure you’ve already tried that). There are ever so many scary trolls and monsters floating around ‘out there’ in internet world…..it’s frightening, indeed!
Best wishes Dearie!! 🖤
oh dear, poor you, i’m lucky enough never to have had any trouble like this.
What i find amazing is that there are people who actually have the time to sit and do this, i mean what are they gaining from it? There are some truely strange creatures in our world.
Vanessa – I hope you’ve changed your password.
Usually that will take care of this piece of virus that you’ve picked up.
Just change your password and give it a few days to correct itself.
I never ever get to see the spams on my computer except if I decide to. I am at “orange”, a french company I suppose and they or my computer has an antispam program (software). So, I never bother about them!
Another mystery: when I clicked on your blog address in the name of visitors on my blog, I arrived on a very long list of “nice blogs” (thanks for having put mine), and I cannot find it again… disappeared!!
Have the most beautiful day, Vanessa, and never mind for the list.
That would be totally unfair.
Because then Madonna would get all this cool stuff she didn’t even deserve.
AND, technically, I guess you wouldn’t even have to pay postage. Or maybe you would.
Anyway—-yes, the pie-throwing goblins have gotten into my computer before, too. But they’re usually something to do with Viagra. Muy embarassing.
Icky-yucky-mucky-muck!!!
I hope it gets all sorted quickly.
~Venus
I’m with you, honey. My mom thinks that email spam is just being sent to her…”These people have a lot of time on their hands to be sending me this stuff!” And she would promptly click on each one, open them, and then delete it. It was too hard for her to grab them all and hit the trash can. Oy.
I would never think that you would spam, Miss V. So sorry that it wasted all your time.
Keep thinking happy thoughts.
Enjoy the day!
Erin
Ugh. That happened with my business yahoo address…and is one of the mail reasons I switched to gmail. I even reported it to yahoo and they basically said…nothing they can do. It feels so yucky…especially when you receive spam FROM YOURSELF lol. Hope things improve!~
I get them once a while, and they usually are from an address I don’t even have (ie fo@roseflash.ca, who is fo?!), so I now know and have a filter in my Thunderbird which automatically put them in my Spam folder.
These bounced spam-mails are a pain, but unfortunately you can’t really do anything about it.
For peeps that have their email hacked (in msn or aol), I advise that you get a very secure password (and have one for each of your online accounts.) Because I am now memory-deprived (since the birth of my son), I use an easy-free password generator (and keeper, so you don’t have to remember all of them!) called keepassX (google it, you’ll find it). My 2 cents tech-girl ^_^
OMG!!!!
Thanks for sharing this Vanessa.
I totally undestand that it must drive you crazy. One day someone left a comment on my blog and I didn’t really pay attention at first but then realised it was a whole list of porn sites that a blogger sent to me as a comment. I felt very offended.
Not that I am prude…I am an adult right? but …this was so intusive in my little magical world. I still don’tunderstand why she did this.
But…having your own address stolen…Uurgh! what is wrong with the world? So many beautiful things can be done through the internet and yet…evil is everywhere…so sad…but at least, it reminds us of what side we are in doesn’t it? without evil, they’re wouldn’t be magical ( even though I’d rather do without evil).
Big hugs to you V!
I’m so sorry ~ it is such a yucky feeling. I had the same thing happen on AOL. I just deleted everything that looked suspicious and never open anything unless I know who sent it.
I recently had a virus from Facebook. The apps there are corrupted so I learned that lesson the hard way. A friend experienced the same thing, same time. 🙁 It’s so very sad that some folks delight in doing these malicious things.
Try to put it behind you, ok? We all know you would never do anything like spam us ~ we know you would only send sparkles, magic and love!
xoxo
Pat
Lady V, the same thing happened to me. Actually they hacked into my gmail. It was a pain for a day. Eventually everything went back to normal. I changed my password and everything is fine now.
I feel your frustration, my friend.
You can get through this! We will all help with any positive bits we can! I understand what you said about it not being the end of the world, but, dear it is a little world you have created and so, it makes you feel a little turned over I am sure. I sooooo hope it gets better really soon. I am thinking of you and you have such lovely “karma” for lack of a better word and all will be right in the end. Take care sweetie. Blessings, light and all that is sweet and right to you.
yikes! even though like you said that in the grand scheme of things it really isn’t a big deal, it just seems to be doesn’t it? my email actually got hacked last week and was locked out of my account by said hacker. luckily everything is now sorted out. sucks doesn’t it? oh well, i hope things get sorted for you too miss v!
take good care
xox