New Targets Being Attacked by Aggressive Hackers in New England
Editor's note: This article was written by a Townsquare Media Northern New England contributor and may contain the individual's views, opinions, or personal experiences.
Hacking Scams
It's no secret that scams are on the rise and in so many different ways lately. Before, what used to be a real easy-to-spot scam on Facebook Messenger from somebody asking for $10,000 to be released from whatever foreign country they're being held captive in to get back to the States is now way more advanced.
There are emails coming from what seems like trusted sources -- Netflix, our banks, even our employers -- that are so well disguised that more often than not, people click on them and before we know it, we're locked out of something. Or everything.
In fact, just last week, we highlighted that Boy Meets World star, New England's own Will Friedle, exposed a police scam that targeted his poor parents recently.
Within the last 24 hours, a new threat hit New England multiple times, and it hit pretty close to home.
Because both my best friend and I were hit separately with our own hacking drama in the least likely places.
XBox Hackers
I didn't even realize hacking into someone's XBox was a thing? But here we are, just a day after it happened, highlighting it.
After logging into my XBox yesterday for a Sunday Funday gaming sesh (I think I just reached peak nerd with that sentence), I noticed the display of my best friend's XBox account looked different. His picture was altered and his gamertag was completely different.
The gamertag was switched to something that literally talked about a scam. Sure enough, shot him a text and he confirmed that he got hacked first thing in the morning, had received messages from the hacker that he was going to run up his account bill (which he did), and just caused an all-around annoyance.
Fast forward to this morning, and I had my case of hacking drama.
Spotify Hackers
Until yesterday, I didn't realize that hacking an XBox was a thing, but I definitely didn't think hacking a Spotify account was a thing either. But sure enough, while I was flipping through my emails this morning, I came across a couple from Spotify mentioning my email on the account had been changed and so had my password.
Thankfully, like my best friend and his XBox drama, I got the Spotify drama fixed pretty quickly. Although, I will say, I didn't trust the link in the email that I was sent at all, so after researching how to contact Spotify outside of a logged in account, I came across their @SpotifyCares account on Twitter and after a few DMs, problem solved.
Whether or not these new hacking targets are specific to New England (for now) or not, I'm not entirely sure. But happening in two different New England states within 24 hours? Seems fishy.
Might be a good time to go through all your accounts and update your passwords, just to be safe.