Was my mail address leaked?

[TCM]

Hi,

from my server logs:

reject: RCPT from host81-154-221-200.range81-154.btcentralplus.com[81.154.221.200]: 504 5.5.2 <Z>: Helo command rejected: need fully-qualified hostname; from=<webmaster@aol.com> to=<[...]> proto=ESMTP helo=<Z>

[...] is a unique-to-this-forum mail address in the form bitcointalk.org-$4randomchars@$mydomain

Do the admins of this forum know anything about that host 81.154.221.200? How does it know the mail address I use here?

Cheers

[matt4054]

Yes, you registered in early 2014 and the user database was leaked since then.

[TCM]

Oh, must have gone past me back then. Will change the address. Thanks.

Funny that I only casually notice because it flies by in my server log. I never actually received a (scam/spam) mail since then. They seem to be too stupid to follow the most basic mail delivery practices. Gotta love stupid scammers.

Edit: Actually, I changed my password on 2015-05-25, so I _did_ notice, but didn't change my mail address.

[Anegg]

Yes, you registered in early 2014 and the user database was leaked since then.

Oh wow. That really sucks. But what are they going to do with your email anyway. Spam it. meh.

[TCM]

Well, not anymore.

In other places, people didn't even know there was a leak until I asked them why my unique address was spammed. For example, one forum installed Tapatalk and found out this way that the plugin transferred the complete user database to Tapatalk. It was only when Tapatalk screwed up and spammed all addresses with a Beta notification that this was discovered.

People always assume that mail adresses getting spammed is just a fact of life. If you follow the leads a bit, you can see exactly where the leaks are. And if you disable leaked addresses and generate new ones, spam doesn't even reach you en masse.