Your email might have been hacked in the past and you might not even know it. Though there are some indications that your email has been compromised, the best way to find out is by using email hacking notification websites like haveibeenpwned.com. Keep reading to find out how this website works and what you should do in the immediate aftermath of an email hack.
How to use Haveibeenpwned.com
Havibeenpwned.com is the creation of a Microsoft Regional Director named Troy Hunt. There is no fee to use haveibeenpwned.com. It is a quick and easy way to determine if someone besides yourself or other authorized users have accessed your email account(s). Simply enter your email address on the homepage and click the “pwned?” icon to the right of the text box. This service will let you know if your email account has been compromised in one of the seemingly endless data breaches that occur on the web. Haveibeenpwned.com also notifies users when their email accounts are improperly accessed at future points in time. This function is accessible through the website’s “Notify me” tab.
Haveibeenpwned.com even allows users to search entire domains to find out each and every email address that has been accessed through a data breach. This feature is possible if the sleuth controls the domain he desires to search. Subscribe to the website’s service and you will tap into its remarkable power to gauge the integrity of specific email accounts.
What to do After an Email Breach
An email hack is an uncomfortable and demeaning experience no one should endure. Unfortunately, emails are hacked on a regular basis. Do not panic if you are the victim of an email breach. Your first course of action should be to check in with friends and colleagues to determine if they have received email from your account that you did not actually send. If they have received such a message, it is likely that your computer’s security has been compromised in addition to that of your email account. Do not enter your personal information or any other sensitive data onto your computer before cleansing it of viruses, malware and any other intrusive software. Let your family, social and professional circles know that your email has been hacked. Tell them to avoid clicking email messages sent from your account. Encourage them to make use of a recently updated firewall as well as anti-virus protection and updated security patches so email compromised by hackers does not transmit viruses to their computers.
The next step is to create a new email address. It is prudent to start anew as your compromised email address is no longer secure. Be sure to use an extremely strong password with a combination of numbers, letters and special characters to make it difficult for hackers to access your new account. Refrain from making online purchases with your email hacked account. Do not hesitate to establish an additional email account that you strictly use for online purchases. Scan your entire computer for viruses and eliminate those viruses before conducting online shopping.
