Secure Gmail Accounts Appear to Be Emailing Spam

Google is currently dealing with one of the more bizarre cases of email spam we've seen. Gmail users with completely secure accounts are discovering spam messages in their sent folders. They didn't send these emails and have no idea how they got there.

As Mashable reports, the emails listed in the sent folder are your typical spam messages offering to lend cash, weight loss solutions, and growth supplements for men. The discovery of the emails led some users to change their Gmail account password, but others confirmed two-factor authorization was still active and working on their account so turned to Google's Help Forum.

It turns out Gmail users have nothing to worry about and their accounts remain secure. Google explained that this is indeed a spam campaign, but the messages appearing in sent folders were never sent from the accounts. In a statement, Google explained that, "This attempt involved forged email headers that made it appear as if users were receiving emails from themselves, which also led to those messages erroneously appearing in the Sent folder."

Each email looks as though it was sent to around 10 recipients, none of which are known to affected users. Many of the messages are also being sent via telus.com, but the Canadian telecomms company has confirmed none of the messages are being generated by Telus or sent via Telus' servers.

Google insists only a small subset of users are affected and it is working to ensure all the rogue emails are reclassified as spam. I'm sure the Gmail team is also trying to figure out exactly how this was allowed to happen in the first place. It's certainly embarrassing for the company, but thankfully no Gmail accounts seem to have been compromised.

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