Hacked accounts commence phishing scam

The hacked accounts of Hotmail, Gmail and Yahoo users are being used to send phishing spam, reports security company Websense.The spam emails are targeting those on the compromised accounts’ contacts list in an attempt to get unwitting recipients to expose personal information.The fake email recommends products to the addressee and invites them to click on a link to a shopping site.The site is, in fact, fake and is instead just a method of acquiring bank details from unsuspecting surfers.Early last week username and password details for over 10,000 Hotmail accounts were posted on the Web site pastebin.com.Later in the week it was reported that both Gmail and Yahoo had fallen victim to the phishing operation as well.