When I watch cop shows and there has been an internet criminal being hunted, their techies seem to know how to find the criminal. Is this fiction? Got an e mail from Walmart. I have shopped there but, to my knowledge, have never “joined” and given them a password and an e mail from them tells me I have a password hat has just been “updated”. What are they talking about?

LinkedIn has also been compromised. I did join, gave them a profile, am routinely informed that I have been selected in a search. I no longer wish to find work through LinkedIn and haven’t bothered canceling. They’re telling me my password has been updated. I told them to cancel my account. But that, too, requires an identity confirmation, that is involved. Screw it. Let it sit there. Paypal tells me the same. I haven’t used Paypal in 10 years. I find them grossly unreliable. I forget now what soured me on them but I trust my past decision, and it tells me to not use them, so I don’t. If a site insists, I cancel the order.

I Googled techie advice on scammers and got a lot of tips that I already observe. I can always spot a phish even if it is from a place I deal with like, for instance, my phone provider. When I try to forward to a fraud line, the e mail won’t send. Sometimes I find my way around the scammer’s self-protection devices and manage to get the relevant information to a fraud site. I have gone so far as to copy the info and send it snail mail.

Recently I got a phone call from a sobbing female. Who are you? Your sister, she said. I said, with pain refreshed, my sister is dead. Click. Surely their random search for a woman who has a sister she hasn’t been in touch with is more than futile? They must go through hundreds of calls before they hit a mark who doesn’t remember what her sister really sounds like. And, of course, my grandson calls. That’s a neat trick, I responded, “I didn’t have children.” Click.

Anyway, I am ignoring every new e mail I get that tells me my password has been successfully changed. The ones I care about have been fixed, the others are just so much garbage cluttering my inbox.

I had a nightmare of support chats with my e mail provider because they had blocked access. Someone was using my e mail to send spam, they said. The chats would quit in the middle and I’d have to start over. Finally, phoned the company (takes a half hour to get a person) and my e mail was released.

I wonder how long this is going to go on. My techie came, with mask and gloves, and helped me through most of it, and he fixed Ed’s printer, and the total was $175. Well worth it, but what if this isn’t over?

If any of you know someone who knows how to track a hacker, put me in touch.

xx, Teal