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MichaelC's avatar
MichaelC
New Contributor
7 years ago

haveibeenpwned.com

I entered my email address in haveibeenpwned.com and it turned up that my email address was found to be compromised in two places on the "dark web". I think if your email address is compromised you would get spam emails. One solution I think is to delete my email address and make a new one. This would make my email address available to someone else and if someone else take up my email address will they be affected? I've changed my passwords in many web sites and I'm not sure which web sites had my email address compromised and I may have missed some web sites. After I did this my email address is still compromised in two places. How do I make my email address come "clean" in haveibeenpwnded.com?

  • Bruce's avatar
    Bruce
    Honored Contributor III

    I don't know what haveibeenpwnded does.  Would they charge a fee for something?

    I also don't know how "security" companies scan the contents of servers.  Administrators of the Dark Web are sneaky but not sneaky enough to secure the contents on their servers from being scanned?

    I also don't know what makes an email address become compromised.  I'm sure your address is already on the Internet.  It's on haveibeenpwnded.  What difference does it make if it's also on some unregistered server?  I'm sure mine is.  In fact, I'll just assume every scammer, hacker and terrorist in the world has my full name and email address.  What can they do that legitimate companies don't already do?  Send me stuff?

    Email addresses don't get compromised.  Login credentials get compromised.  I'm glad you were spooked into changing your passwords.  Spooked or not, you should routinely change your passwords.

    The "Dark Web" has become a marketing term.  Marketers are selling fear.  I don't believe a "security" company has ever confirmed an address is not on the dark side.  It'll be cheaper to just assume it is.