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Post by drlj on Apr 8, 2023 8:24:39 GMT -5
Since I have an IPhone & an IPad, I have an ICloud email. I rarely use it but about a year ago I started getting email for a woman in CA. The first thing that came in was account information for a charge card she set up at a clothing store. I assumed it was a scam and called the store about it. They removed the email address. Then other account info started to come in—receipts from CVS, orders from other stores, etc. I contacted Apple several times via their customer service email and got back assurances of how concerned they were but the emails continued. I actually talked to humans at Apple a few times and, finally, one of them told me the woman in question had an email “similar” to mine but they would contact her and take care of it. Nothing came for 2-3 months so I figured it was taken care of. Then, they started again. Email receipts listing account information, address, purchases, bus schedules for trips she was taking, junk mail based on purchases or donations, e-tickets to plays, you name it. All of it giving me more personal information about this stranger than I want or should have. I have contacted Apple well over a dozen times. I have told them the email isn’t malicious but they need to do something to stop it because someone a bit more unscrupulous than I am could use this info in not so nice ways. I had tried to contact the woman, but email comes right back to me. I don’t know how her email is different—capitals, characters, etc, so I have had no success. I decided last week to snail mail her and tell her all of this stuff in the hopes she could solve it on her end. She probably thinks my letter is some sort of scam, but I told her all the personal info I have gotten, the receipts, tickets, account information, etc., and now all I can do is hope she contacts Apple instead of the police and takes care of this. Until then, I am blocking everything that comes in so it goes into the spam folder. If they are sending me her tickets instead of sending them to her, wouldn’t you think she would think, “h’mm. I wonder where my tickets are?” This is just nuts to me and it is Apple’s fault but all them there genius types don’t seem to understand there is a problem. I have decided that either she is careless in listing her email and does it wrong, the stores she is dealing with screw it up somehow by missing a capital or asterisk, or she is really stupid. If some of you genius types have a suggestion on how to better handle this, I would like to hear it.
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Post by Marshall on Apr 8, 2023 8:38:14 GMT -5
Send a cruise missile to her address.
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Post by drlj on Apr 8, 2023 9:26:44 GMT -5
If I was getting your personal information, credit limits, access to your accounts, trips schedules, phone number, etc., you might view it differently. She is lucky I am at least somewhat honest. I can cancel her accounts, get into her information, place or cancel orders, change her vacation bookings, address, and many, many other things. I could have 20 large screen TVs delivered from one place if I wanted to do so. I do see some humor in all of this but it really isn’t a frivolous thing. And I am at a loss as to how to deal with it.
And I want to thank her for making a political donation so that now I get 35 political junk email every day besides her CVS receipts for Poppycock. 😵💫😵💫
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Post by Marty on Apr 8, 2023 9:48:28 GMT -5
If I was getting your personal information, credit limits, access to your accounts, trips schedules, phone number, etc., you might view it differently. She is lucky I am at least somewhat honest. I can cancel her accounts, get into her information, place or cancel orders, change her vacation bookings, address, and many, many other things. I could have 20 large screen TVs delivered from one place if I wanted to do so. I do see some humor in all of this but it really isn’t a frivolous thing. And I am at a loss as to how to deal with it. And I want to thank her for making a political donation so that now I get 35 political junk email every day besides her CVS receipts for Poppycock. 😵💫😵💫 The usual mistake is Capital I for lower case l, that is the method scammers use to disguise emails.
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Post by drlj on Apr 8, 2023 9:50:31 GMT -5
I suppose I could cancel the vacation she just booked or upgrade to the Presidental Suite.
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Post by John B on Apr 8, 2023 9:54:24 GMT -5
My first initial and last name are both common and rare. I have had the same e-mail address for 20 years. Occasionally others with the same combination of initial and name will sign up for stuff using my e-mail address. I'll get an e-mail welcoming me to the website, so I'll go to the site, say "e-mail me a new password" and change it.
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Post by drlj on Apr 8, 2023 10:06:03 GMT -5
I have actually done that. It doesn’t stop the email. It might screw up her access to the account, but, if only I get that access, I haven’t really solved my problem. She buys something, I get the receipt. She books a bus trip, I get the receipt, schedule, and e-ticket. I have actually cancelled some of her bus rides. Guess who the refund comes to?
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Post by Jawbone on Apr 8, 2023 10:57:13 GMT -5
Can't you change your email address? Or with all the info you have on her, change hers?
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Post by epaul on Apr 8, 2023 11:06:58 GMT -5
Do the emails you get have the appearance of being from one person in one place, or from many people in many places? There may not be a single legitimate (even alive) user on the other end, it may be an email address that has been sold and gone rogue.
I have four email addresses. I use one for junk stuff. And I use another for slightly less junky stuff. One I use only for personal contacts with people I want personal contact with. And I have one that is attached to my financial accounts and is not used for anything other than logging on to them.
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,915
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Post by Dub on Apr 8, 2023 11:09:29 GMT -5
LJ, do you know what she thinks her email address is supposed to be? Was it her intent, when setting up her Apple account that her email (login) ID be such that it accidentally matched yours exactly?
Of course they aren’t exactly the same. Apple’s (or any provider’s) systems won’t register exact duplicates. I doesn’t seem to me that the problem is a technical one. It seems to me like a human problem. Something similar happened to Fiddlerina. Her primary email address includes the string “joy.” Someone else had exactly the same email address except the string included was “joi." Evidently people typing in the email address saw Joi and automatically typed Joy without thinking.
Apple’s system is just routing email based on the string of characters it receives as an email address. If protocols don’t return an error indicating the address is invalid, the message is considered sent. Any time an email is sent by any person, company, or bot using an email address exactly matching yours, it’s going to be delivered to you.
I’m guessing your iCloud email address is the same as your Apple account login.
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Post by dradtke on Apr 8, 2023 11:22:17 GMT -5
I have four email addresses. I use one for junk stuff. I was wondering why you never answer my emails.
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Post by drlj on Apr 8, 2023 11:53:29 GMT -5
Do the emails you get have the appearance of being from one person in one place, or from many people in many places? There may not be a single legitimate (even alive) user on the other end, it may be an email address that has been sold and gone rogue. I have four email addresses. I use one for junk stuff. And I use another for slightly less junky stuff. One I use only for personal contacts with people I want personal contact with. And I have one that is attached to my financial accounts and is not used for anything other than logging on to them. They come from a variety of sources—CVS, Walgreens, Dept.stores, Flixbus( A ride booking service), etc., etc.. All are addressed to her. Most include her address, shipping, info, receipts, etc. There are no personal email from Aunt Sally or a friend. She uses this address for online purchases and booking. it is one person who is somehow screwing up when she lists her email. This is not malicious. It is, perhaps, a whole lot of stupid. I have called some of the businesses and had the email address taken off because those businesses have sent receipts for items she purchased. She was known to them and not in a bad way. I have not had repeat email from them. Some places, if you can contact them at all, hook you up with a robot & trying to talk to a human to solve the problem is close to, if not completely, impossible. She has a good deal more to lose in this than I do. I can delete & block things. I can also change her bookings, get into her accounts, and do lots of other things. I won’t, but could.
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Post by drlj on Apr 8, 2023 11:59:50 GMT -5
LJ, do you know what she thinks her email address is supposed to be? Was it her intent, when setting up her Apple account that her email (login) ID be such that it accidentally matched yours exactly? Of course they aren’t exactly the same. Apple’s (or any provider’s) systems won’t register exact duplicates. I doesn’t seem to me that the problem is a technical one. It seems to me like a human problem. Something similar happened to Fiddlerina. Her primary email address includes the string “joy.” Someone else had exactly the same email address except the string included was “joi." Evidently people typing in the email address saw Joi and automatically typed Joy without thinking. Apple’s system is just routing email based on the string of characters it receives as an email address. If protocols don’t return an error indicating the address is invalid, the message is considered sent. Any time an email is sent by any person, company, or bot using an email address exactly matching yours, it’s going to be delivered to you. I’m guessing your iCloud email address is the same as your Apple account login. When I actually talked to a human at Apple about this, they looked it up and found her address was “similar” to mine. They said they would contact her & take care of it. I don’t know if they contacted her, but it obviously was not taken care of. It is, I think, exactly the same as the problem Joy had.
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Post by TKennedy on Apr 8, 2023 12:30:07 GMT -5
I regularly get a notification from a golf course in Massachusetts that my tee time has been booked. I’ve tried to let them know they have the wrong person but to no avail. I just live with it and pity the poor dude that has probably missed some good outings on the links.
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Post by drlj on Apr 8, 2023 12:40:00 GMT -5
I regularly get a notification from a golf course in Massachusetts that my tee time has been booked. I’ve tried to let them know they have the wrong person but to no avail. I just live with it and pity the poor dude that has probably missed some good outings on the links. Good advice. Like I said, I can block and delete.
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Post by John B on Apr 8, 2023 13:55:36 GMT -5
I have actually done that. It doesn’t stop the email. It might screw up her access to the account, but, if only I get that access, I haven’t really solved my problem. She buys something, I get the receipt. She books a bus trip, I get the receipt, schedule, and e-ticket. I have actually cancelled some of her bus rides. Guess who the refund comes to? Yes, I also made up an e-mail address for Jana and changed the e-mail address on the account.
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Post by Marshall on Apr 8, 2023 14:26:40 GMT -5
I have four email addresses. I use one for junk stuff. And I use another for slightly less junky stuff. One I use only for personal contacts with people I want personal contact with. And I have one that is attached to my financial accounts and is not used for anything other than logging on to them. I have multiple email addresses too. Friends and family are on one. Music people are on another. Anything I buy or register for goes to a 3rd email (Lotsa junk mail shows up there). A work related email. I even have one for my HS reunion group.
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Post by jdd2 on Apr 8, 2023 16:19:59 GMT -5
I'd've been simply redirecting it all to spam/junk. You're not responsible for what the internet does.
Getting you hooked into doing something about it is like sinking the fish hook.
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Post by t-bob on Apr 8, 2023 16:49:29 GMT -5
Mine is probably different. I guess but all I do is text and email (one email) I have almost 50 accounts - IDs and passwords. I'm trying to keep it to be simple. I've asked a few people I would like to text or email and they won't give it to me. I'm a good friend
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Post by t-bob on Apr 8, 2023 17:13:12 GMT -5
My first initial and last name are both common and rare. I have had the same e-mail address for 20 years. Occasionally others with the same combination of initial and name will sign up for stuff using my e-mail address. I'll get an e-mail welcoming me to the website, so I'll go to the site, say "e-mail me a new password" and change it. I tried to call you two times - Soundhole Private Messenger ? I'd like your email or text please - brief aphasia and communication Bob
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