Registered for avast account then received suspicious email

[LadyA]

Hi, I have the paid version of Avast.  Had it for a while now.  After the upgrade to Avast 7, I guess I had to create an account to connect?  So I did that, but the confirmation email looked very strange and now I'm wondering if there's something wrong or if I somehow have malware or a fake version of Avast?

I'm moderately computer literate, but just not when it comes to this kind of thing.  I'm always so paranoid about viruses and malware, etc.

The email looked like this (screen shot):


It doesn't look like any kind of normal registration confirmation, to me. Am I worrying for no reason or...?  As you can see, the message bottom said only "registration.email.content".  What does that mean? 

[I'm running Vista SP2 on Dell desktop PC, if that matters]

[DavidR]

I believe it is your my.avast.com account creation/activation email, see image extract example of mine.

Have you just/recently created your my.avast.com account ?

[LadyA]

Yep, just last night I registered at my.avast.com for the first time.  So I was expecting an email, but this one just looked strange.  There were no links or anything and no option to "show content," etc.  Just these three words: "registration.email.content"

It's fixed now, though! :-)  It must have been an email error or something, because I just tried to log in at my.avast.com and it told me I have an "unverified account" and I need to follow the confirmation email... I selected "resend confirmation email" and now I have received the exact same email as you did.

Thanks, I actually didn't even know where to go for log in until you said my.avast.com!

[FlyingRobot]

I'd be interested to know if anyone checked the headers when they received such a questionable message.  More specifically, did the recipient's SMTP server receive the email *directly* from verifiable/verified avast machine or did avast send the email through a CRM type intermediary?

[DavidR]

Yep, just last night I registered at my.avast.com for the first time.  So I was expecting an email, but this one just looked strange.  There were no links or anything and no option to "show content," etc.  Just these three words: "registration.email.content"

It's fixed now, though! :-)  It must have been an email error or something, because I just tried to log in at my.avast.com and it told me I have an "unverified account" and I need to follow the confirmation email... I selected "resend confirmation email" and now I have received the exact same email as you did.

Thanks, I actually didn't even know where to go for log in until you said my.avast.com!

You're welcome.

[DavidR]

I'd be interested to know if anyone checked the headers when they received such a questionable message.  More specifically, did the recipient's SMTP server receive the email *directly* from verifiable/verified avast machine or did avast send the email through a CRM type intermediary?

I generally don't check the headers if it is something that I'm expecting, I also use MailWasher Pro and I can view content in text mode only. Only if I consider it legit does it ever get downloaded from the email server.

This one does confirm sent from avast in the headers though.

[FlyingRobot]

This one does confirm sent from avast in the headers though.

Thank you for looking/commenting.  I would expect avast, particularly given the context and its expertise and accessibility to infrastructure etc, to handle their own email.  However, a similar thing could be said about various financial institutions and some of them are handing client information to CRM firms.  FWIW, if anyone reading this cares about such a thing, do check those headers so you at least have a better sense of what is going on. 

[LadyA]

Good advice.  I always read my headers, too.  I don't even open things unless I know who it's from.  In this case, I had just registered with my.avast.com, so I was expecting some kind of email confirmation.  It was just that what I got was very strange looking (see screen shot a few comments up).  Made me think I just registered at a fake avast service or something.  It must have just been some sort of error, though.  When I had them resend the confirmation, I got a fixed version of the email that actually had links and text in it... was able to successfully verify my account via that one.

[lindawing]

I got the first one, too, and filed it away. There seemed nothing I could do with it. My Avast Pro 7 screen told me I was registered.

So then I tried to log in to my account, with the correct e-mail and the password I KNOW I set up (and believe me, it was very hard to do that, because of the stupid e-captcha stuff that is so idiotically hard to read).

Guess what? I couldn't get logged in, because my e-mail address (which is the one showing on my Avast screen, now) or my password was incorrect. So...I asked to have my password sent to me.

I didn't get my password. Instead, I got a note saying that my password had been reset. OK, fine. I can deal with that. So I followed the link provided.

Guess what? I got the screen showed in the attachment.

So I went to the account page, and tried to log in, but I don't have the correct password, now, of course.

So I sent for a password change again. Again I got the e-mail with the new link. Again I got the Page Not Shown.

There is no way I can get into my account, since I can't access it through anything sent me by Avast! This is upsetting me no end.

I have been told in another topic, that the account isn't necessary to running Avast! I can SEE that. My Avast! Pro 7 is running just fine on MY computer, though I can't get it to update on either of my husband's computers, so I'm waiting until the installer problem has been taken care of.

All in all, though I'm thankful that my own computer is definitely protected, I'm NOT happy with this upgrade, and the new ACCOUNT thing! Why on Earth is it even THERE, if it's not important, and why don't the links from Avast! WORK?!


Well, now another try HAS allowed me, at least, to change my password. It now says it has sent me another e-mail. Let's see what happens.

OK...all is good, now. I still haven't received the confirmation e-mail (after four tries in the last 10 minutes), but I HAVE been able to log in to my account here at avast.com. Hooray!

[LadyA]

What a pain!  Hope it all works out! 

I'm also noticing that ever since the upgrade to Avast 7, strange things have been happening in my internet browsers (both Chrome & Firefox).  May be unrelated, but it never happened till I upgraded.  Sometimes my email is completely messed up, and sometimes pages just won't load, even though I have a good connection.  It's really strange.

I guess the virus protection industry is a lot like the pharmaceutical industry, haha (throw it out on the market before it's been tested and find out afterwards what the consequences are). 

[lindawing]

I don't seem to be having any of those types of problems, but I've seen plenty of posts by others, who have had them!

I use FireFox, and have the latest update (came in just a few days ago). If you don't have the automatic updates going for FireFox, that could be what's causing something to happen. I haven't tried Chrome since the Avast! update, but I generally only use it for the little games--like Angry Birds. ;-)

I was thinking more of comparing this upgrade to some of the things that EA (Electronic Arts) puts out. I play The Sims (now The Sims 3), and it seems they're always putting out more "advances," without fixing the glitches in what they've already published! It gets rather irritating.

As a general rule, though, Avast! isn't that way. I think some things happened this time, that they truly weren't expecting. They'll get it fixed.

[LadyA]

I do love Avast, so it was harsh of me to make that comparison (pharmaceuticals)... but there sure are other companies and ventures where the comparison works, lol.

My Chrome and Firefox are both updated, so that must not have been it, but... 

Last night I actually had to uninstall Avast with their uninstall program (wouldn't let me do it via the control panel), and then completely re-install it.  Something must have went wrong during my upgrade, I guess.  After looking online, I saw that it should have given me options for Express Install or Custom Install, etc... but I never got any of that and my computer froze and wouldn't shut down after it was finished doing whatever it was doing.  I had to hold my power button down for a long time to get it to restart.

Even after that, computer rebooted fine... but then noticed the weird browser stuff.  It didn't dawn on me till late last night that maybe there was an error in the middle of my upgrade and that I should try it again.

Everything is working perfectly fine after I uninstalled in safe mode and then re-installed 7, so not sure what happened the first time around.   

[lindawing]

Thankfully, my hubby's laptop stopped about a third of the way through the install and wouldn't go any further. I had him reboot and try again, and then it just stuck at "inializing," and wouldn't go any further. So I told him to cancel, and we'll stick with vs. 6 on both of his computers until the installer is fixed.