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What Should I Do If My eBay Account Was Hacked
eBay accounts are a desired destination amongst hackers. The popular online marketplace has about 162 million users who seek to buy and sell all kinds of products to and from all over the world and also store in their accounts private and sensitive information, and other personal information.
Just not long ago hackers gained access to 145 million eBay records and eBay released a statement urging all of it users to change their passwords.
If you suspect your eBay account has been hacked, but still have access to your account, do the following:
1. Change Your Password
Go to the following page http://my.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?MyeBay&CurrentPage=MyeBayPersonalInfo and change your password.
Choose a complex password, with lower case letters, upper case letters and digits. If possible, add special characters like hash or exclamation point. Make sure it is at least 8 characters long. It is best not to pick dictionary words.
2. Verify your E-mail hasn’t changed
On the same page, make sure that your E-mail address hasn’t changed. If a hacker changes the E-mail address associated with your account, he may be able to re-obtain access to it despite the password change.
It is impossible to just view the existing registered address, as eBay only shows you the first and last letter of your E-mail account. To make sure the E-mail associated with your account has not changed, click on “Edit” and go through the process of re-defining the E-mail account. You will need to provide the E-mail address again, as well as solve a captcha.
3. Set up security questions
To improve the security of your account, it is recommended to set up security questions. On the same page, click “Create” to set those questions up.
When attempting to restore access to your account, ebay will then ask for these security questions. This should make the process of re-obtaining access to your account harder for a hacker.
If you already have security questions, replace them with new ones.
4. Verify your Paypal account information are accurate
As hackers may try to play around with the definitions of the Paypal accounts associated with your ebay one, go to http://my.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?MyeBay&CurrentPage=MyeBayPayPalAccounts and verify that nothing has changed in terms of linked Paypal accounts. Has an account been added? Removed? Or changed?
5. Check Your Other Accounts
If you are re-using your password in other websites, such as Facebook or iCloud – change the passwords on these services immediately to prevent further online identity theft. If you’re wondering;was my Gmail hacked along with my other e-mail accounts? Make sure you are still able to log into these services. Attackers often use password re-use (an ill-advised but common practice) to gain access to additional accounts of the victim!
6. Run an Anti-Virus on your Computer
Many times attackers gain their victims’ passwords using Trojan horses that were installed on the victims’ computers. If your machine is infected, changing the password will not help, as the malware will capture the new password and send it to the hacker.
What happens if my passwords have been changed?
If you are unable to log into your E-mail account, use the following form http://ocsnext.ebay.com/ocs/cusr?query=1586&levelHierarchy=3a5a1 and click on “Contact Us”.
