Jun 2, 2008 - Several free tools can help you find lost passwords you can't. At the ease and speed with which the Ophcrack Live CD cracked my. Microsoft Outlook PST (Personal Folders) files: For that old email archive.

It seems like not a day goes by where I don’t get a question from someone that boils down to their email account having been hacked. Someone, somewhere, has gained access to their account, and is using it to send, access other online accounts, hassle contacts, and more. Sometimes passwords are changed, sometimes not. Sometimes traces are left, sometimes not. Sometimes everything in the account is erased — including contacts and saved email — and sometimes not. Your email account has been hacked. Here’s what you need to do next.

Become a and go ad-free! Recover your account Log in to your email account via your provider’s website. If you can log in successfully, consider yourself extremely lucky, and proceed to Step 2 right away. If you can’t log in, even though you’re sure you’re using the right password, then the has probably changed your password. The password you know is no longer the correct password. You must then use the “I forgot my password” or other account recovery options offered by the service. Bagishlau dogasi.

This usually means the service will send password-reset instructions to an alternate email address that you have access to, or send a text message to a mobile phone number you set up previously. If the recovery methods don’t work — because the hacker changed everything, or because you no longer have access to the old alternate email or phone — you may be out of luck. If recovery options don’t work for whatever reason, your only recourse is to use the customer service phone numbers or email addresses provided by that email service.

For free email accounts, there usually is no customer service. Your options are generally limited to self-service recovery forms, knowledge base articles, and official discussion forums where service representatives may (or may not) participate. For paid accounts, there are typically additional customer service options that are more likely to be able to help.

Important: If you cannot recover access to your account, it is now someone else’s account. I can’t stress this enough. It is now the hacker’s account. Unless you’ve backed it up, everything in it is gone forever, and you can skip the next two items.

You’ll need to set up a new account from scratch and start over. Is it my computer or not? When faced with this situation, many people worry that on their computer is responsible. Turns out that’s rarely the case. In the vast majority of these situations, your computer was never involved.

The problem is not on your computer. The problem is simply that someone else figured out your password and has logged into your account. They could be on the other side of the planet, far away from you and your computer (and often they are). Yes, it’s possible that a key-logger was used to capture your password. Yes, it’s possible that your PC was used improperly at an hotspot.