Recently, we have seen a significant increase in the amount of spam mail hitting the e-mail servers. The reason that this occurred is because a few folks from within the community were fooled into replying to earlier spam messages, in which they provided their user name and password. The spammers then used that information to send mail from the accounts of those users. Information Technology Services has been in contact with the folks who have compromised accounts, and is working to get that straightened out.
This is a good time to remind everyone that ITS will never ask for you to e-mail your account information to us. We will never request you “verify your account” via e-mail, or anything of that nature. As a general rule, banks, credit card companies, and other online entities will also never do this. Therefore, if you ever get a message that suggests that you should provide your account information, even if it looks like a legitimate e-mail coming from a known address, don’t do it.