Yahoo users who have received emails claiming their mailboxes have exceeded their limits and will be deactivated and blocked, should not click on the link within them. This is because the email messages are phishing scams being sent by cyber criminals to their potential victims in an attempt to trick them into visiting a phishing website that steals email account usernames and passwords.
The "Yahoo Your E-mail Account will Soon Exceed its Limit" Phishing Scam
From: Yahoo <signal29ib@yahoo.com>
Sent: Monday, December 3, 2018 8:22 PM
Subject: Mail Box Service Will Be Blocked(FINAL WARNING)"
Dear Account User,
Your E-mail account will soon exceed its limit. Yahoo! recommends you Upgrade and Verifyyour account to prevent your email from being De-activated within 24hr s. Please open the attachment for your account upgrade and verification.
This is to improve our service quality. We are sorry for inconveniences
Property: Account Security
Sincerely,
Yahoo! member services
Copyright © 2018Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved
If the link in the phishing email message is clicked by the recipients, they will be taken to a phishing website and ask to sign-in. If they attempt to do so, their Yahoo account credentials (usernames and passwords) will be sent to the cybercriminals behind the scam. Once the cybercriminals have gotten the stolen credentials, they will gain access to the accounts, hijack them, and use them fraudulently.
Therefore, Yahoo users who have received email messages with a link to update their information or make changes to their accounts should always go directly to mail.yahoo.com and sign into their accounts instead of clicking on the link. Once Yahoo users have signed into their accounts, they will be noticed of changes or updates, if there are any. Going directly to mail.yahoo.com and signing in from there is only guaranteed way of preventing Yahoo users from becoming victims of phishing scams.
Yahoo users who have already been tricked by the phishing scam are asked change their passwords immediately before their accounts are hijacked and used fraudulently. If their accounts have already been hijacked by cybercriminals, they can click here for instructions to regain access to their accounts.