To learn more about e-gold check out my e-gold tutorial, or to read more about keeping your computer secure, read my computer security tips page.

Read below for a copy of the phishing e-mail (link removed).

Received from: AccountRobot_donotreply@e-gold.com

Dear e-gold account holder,

Due to concerns, for the safety and integrity of your account we
have issued this warning message.

It has come to our attention that you are involved with High Yield
Investment Program (HYIP) industry. Therefore, you will have to
agree with new Account User Agreement modifications, if you want
to continue using our services.

Once you have reviewed and agreed with these modifications your
e-gold account service will not be interrupted and will continue
as normal. Failure to accept a new agreement will lead to account
termination.

Please use a particular link below to login to your account.

Proceed to an agreement review page

Thank you in advance for your prompt response.
Please do not reply to this automatically generated email message.

Here’s the e-mail I received:

Effective Monday, December 10, 2007, FirePay will no longer allow funding, spending, or payment transactions. FirePay account holders will still be able to access their account to review their online statement, register and validate their bank account, and withdraw any existing balance free of charge for a 150-day period ending on Thursday, May 8, 2008. After this date the FirePay website will no longer allow account access and all further inquiries will have to be directed to FirePay via email at info@firepay.com. Any requests for withdrawal of a remaining balance after Thursday, May 8, 2008, will incur a $25 payment handling fee. Please sign in to your account now at www.firepay.com to confirm whether you have a balance and, if so, to initiate a free withdrawal.

Get your withstanding money out of Firepay before you get hit with those fees!

The e-mail attemptes to scare you into thinking your e-gold account was deactivated and gives you a link to correct the issue. This is entirely false, e-gold has NOT deactivated ANYONE’S ACCOUNT. Go ahead and delete the e-mail, or better yet, forward it to the US-CERT and then delete it. For more information about e-gold, read my e-gold tutorial.

Here’s a copy of the e-mail:

This email is to inform you, that we had to deactivate your e-gold account access because we have been notified that your account may have been compromised by outside parties.

Our terms and conditions you agreed to state that your account must always be under your control or those you designate at all times. We have noticed some unusual activity related to your account that indicates that other parties may have access and or control of your information in your account.

These parties have in the past been involved with money laundering, illegal drugs, terrorism and various Federal Title 18 violations.

Account access will remain disabled until this issue will be solved. If you are the rightful holder of the account, please click on the link bellow and log in to your e-gold account.

https://www.e-gold.com/acct/login.html

The link will take you to our Account access page.

Please be aware that until we can verify your identity no further access to your account will be allowed and we will have no other liability for your account or any transactions that may have occurred as a result of your failure to reactivate your account as instructed above.

Limited Time Offer!

For a limited time StormPay.com will pay it’s members $1.00 for each new member you personally refer who register and activate a free StormPay account. No strings and no gimmicks! You refer a new member to StormPay and you get paid $1.00 instantly into your StormPay account!

To participate in the free affiliate program, simply log into your StormPay account and click the “Affiliate Program” link found on the left side menu. There you will find your referral link which you can use to refer new members to StormPay.com. Not only do you earn $1.00 for each new referral, you keep that customer for the life of yours and their account. You will continue to earn 10% of the StormPay fees collected anytime that member makes a purchase from another StormPay member.

Here’s a few reminders about StormPay.com to help you easily refer new members to this great service:

Free Online Auction listings;
StormClix – Get paid to click advertisements;
Low $1 transaction fees;
StormPay Debit Cards;
Free Affiliate Program;
Mass Pay Feature
Subscription Billing;
Easy Button Creation Wizards;
And much more!

At StormPay.com your maximum fee for receiving a payment to your account is only $1.00!

Get started earning great money with this limited time Affiliate promotion. Remember, only one StormPay account per person. Any account holder found abusing the affiliate program will forfeit their StormPay account and all commissions earned.

Thank you,
StormPay.com

Once the Act is signed by President Bush, FirePay will not be able to legally allow its U.S. customers to pay for online gambling merchants. On the first day that the law is in effect (the day the President signs it), FirePay will begin declining any purchase transactions from U.S. FirePay account holders at any gambling merchant site. Ten days after the signing, FirePay will decline any transfer attempt made by any online gambling merchant to a U.S. FirePay account.

All other online merchants will continue to be accepted – this ONLY pertains to online gambling merchants. In addition, this ONLY affects account holders registered in the United States of America.

I’m assuming other payment processors, such as ePassporte and Neteller, will begin e-mailing their account holders similar e-mails if they allowed transactions to/from online gambling merchants in the first place (Paypal wouldn’t send an e-mail because they do not allow transactions with online gambling merchants). Get those online poker withdrawls completed before this Act goes into effect!

From: accounts@e-gold.com

We are contacting you to remind you that on 06.20.06 our Account Review Team identified some unusual activity in your account. In accordance with e-goldВґs User Agreement and to ensure that your account has not been compromised, access to your account was limited. Your account access will remain limited until this issue has been resolved please log in your account or click on the link bellow:

Click here to activate your account

As always, be sure to take all e-mails very seriously, as your security can be compromised simply by clicking a link.

For more on protecting yourself online, read more about security here or at e-gold’s security page

The new system will hopefully be in place, according to AT, by April 28th. After that time, users will have to purchase AlienTrust’s card, receive it via snail mail, and activate it online before they may receive their cashouts. This is new payment system will allow AT to be independent of any 3rd party payment processors. Sounds like a bold move for an auto surf to take, and I hope they are ready for the responsibility of keeping private information very secure – remember the Studiopay hacking ordeal?

On a less serious note, AlienTrust’s shop has officially began selling t-shirts and sweatshirts.

To prevent your money being taken by a hacker in this way, find the program’s e-gold account number posted on their website and manually paste it into your e-gold’s “Spend” page. Avoid using the automatic e-gold payment link just in case it has been hacked. If you are redepositing, check your e-gold “Transaction History” to see the program’s old e-gold account and verify that it’s still the same.