The email message below, which claims that the recipients' Hotmail, Outlook or Live email accounts will be terminated by the Hotmail Security Team, is a phishing scam sent by cybercriminals to frighten the recipients into clicking on a link within the same email message. The link in the fake email message goes to a phishing website that will ask the recipients who have clicked on it to submit their email account user names and passwords to cancel the termination request. But, once the requested information is submitted, it will be sent to the cybercriminals behind the phishing scam.to protect against phishing scams, online users are asked to never click on a link to sign into their online accounts. They should instead, go directly to their online account provider's website by typing the website's address in their web browsers, or use a popular search engine to find their online provider's website.
The Terminate Hotmail, Outlook or Live Accounts Account Phishing Email
From: Hotmail Account masil@masio. onmicrosoft.com
Subject: Warning Messsage
Microsoft Account
Dear Hotmail User,
We received a message to terminate your email account (****@hotmail.com) on 11/05/2016, the process has begun by our Hotmail Security Team…..
This is a warning or your email will be terminated.
Sign in here to cancel termination request.
Thanks for using Hotmail.
Microsoft Team
Copyright ?© 2016 Microsoft
Once cybercriminals have gotten their potential victims’ account credentials (usernames and passwords), they will use it to hijack their Microsoft accounts and use them fraudulently. Therefore, recipients of the phishing email message (see below) who were tricked into clicking on the link within it and have attempted to sign into the phishing or fake website that they were taken, are asked to change their Microsoft account passwords immediately, before they are hijacked and used fraudulently by cybercriminals.
Hotmail or Microsoft email account users who have received suspicious email messages, can verify the authenticity of email messages, but going directly to www.hotmail.com, www.live.com or www.outlook.com and sign into their accounts from there. If there is some thing wrong with their accounts, they will be notified once they have signed in.