Totally bizarre happenings with my email, Amazon and Apple

I don't even really know about to go about describing this because it's so messed up. 
 
I use my personal Gmail account for Amazon (the US store). My email address is, for the sake of argument, myname@gmail.com. Recently I got an email from amazon.co.uk thanking me for opening an account there. I didn't. And almost immediately afterwards, a constant stream of amazon.co.uk emails that are basically receipts for Android apps that someone has downloaded from Amazon.co.uk.  Most of them are free but the occasional paid. It's all the kind of crap that young girls download - fashion model games, wedding planner games, Bubble Pop this, Makeup Artist that. But the email address the receipts are sent to is stated as myname@googlemail.com. And the name associated with this email address is the same as my name, only with a different middle name. 
 
So what's basically happened is that someone has the same email address as me only it's googlemail.com instead of gmail.com. Apparently the two are interchangeable, in that if you have yourname@gmail.com you can also use yourname@googlemail.com. But seemingly this person was able to sign up for the exact same Google user name as mine, only with googlemail instead of gmail. I have no idea why anyone should be able to do such a thing, but there it is. 
 
So armed with this virtual clone of my email address, this person has signed up for an Amazon.co.uk account, and I get their freaking receipt emails. I have also gotten an email from Apple confirming the creation of an Apple ID with this googlemail email account. Of course I can't sign into their Amazon.co.uk or Apple account because I don't have their password. And at least I'm not paying for any of this crap because I don't see any charges coming off the bank account I use for Amazon. 
 
Confusing isn't it? It's like Amazon knows that the two email addresses are different because the Amazon.co.uk account isn't linked to my Amazon.com account and they are not linked to the same bank account. But Google sees the two email addresses as the same, and sends me their email. But does this person get my emails too? It's all very creepy and gives me the jitters. 
 
Of course there is no "I received this email in error" link in the Amazon.co.uk emails, it's a do-not-reply address. And I guess I could contact gmail about the problem, but getting through to that company is like requesting an audience with the Pope. 
 
But overall it's not good that something like this could happen, not good at all. If gmail and googlemail accounts are interchangeable, then how come someone was able to open a googlemail account with a user name that I already use for gmail (and have used since gmail was started in 2004)? And why would they send me their emails to my gmail account? You like to think that something like an email account is infallible, but here I am in 2015 listening into someone else's communication like it's the 1970's and I'm listening to the neighbor's phone calls over a party line (which I remember doing as a kid )
 
Anyone else have any experience with crap like this? 

Sorry to hear that.  I suggest it's worth the effort to put a stop to it, even if that means requesting an audience with the Pope (who I hear is in town by the way).

I don't think you should have used "myname@gmail.com" in the first place. 
 
Maybe you should?

• Call Amazon
• Contact Google
• Block the address in your email client
• Stop buying little girl stuff from the UK 

drewfx1

sharke
I'm 100% certain I've lost 99% of you by this point 

No I think I've got it - you've explained in detail how the "fashion model games, wedding planner games, Bubble Pop this, Makeup Artist that" ended up on your phone. 

Damn. Busted.....

Have someone send porn to that other address and have it say your name along with "Here are the images you ordered!  You are signed up for the Weekly Sex Pack.  Enjoy!"
 
Then THEY will cancel their email address and you won't have to do anything.
 
(J/K I think... )

jamesg1213
Presumably then, the other person isn't get any information from Amazon regarding their orders; would it be worth contacting them and telling them the situation? They might just re-set their account email if you let them know.

Ya.  That's what I meant. 

craigb
Have someone send porn to that other address and have it say your name along with "Here are the images you ordered!  You are signed up for the Weekly Sex Pack.  Enjoy!"
 
Then THEY will cancel their email address and you won't have to do anything.
 
(J/K I think... )

If they're anything like me though, they WILL enjoy....

codamedia
I suspect someone just entered the wrong email account with these company's and it could be completely innocent. BUT - it could be more malicious. They could have opened an account at these places with a stolen credit card and are hiding behind your email address.

• Contact all three places and tell them the problem. Amazon and Apple will likely put a hold on the accounts until the problem is resolved.
• Amazon & Apple would not see "googlemail.com" and "gmail.com" as the same... so yes, their account is not tied to your account in those places.
• I don't believe either of those will confirm the email address for opening an account....
• Have you tried logging into "googlemail.com"? Just go to the gmail login and use the "googlemail.com" address and password. If that works, change your password on the gmail account... just to make sure they don't have your credentials.
• Have fun - request a password reset on their accounts at apple and amazon. Then change it to something stupid. Most likely - they will have to contact the company to resolve the problem and will recognize the email address is wrong. (I suggest you refrain from logging into their accounts after doing this... that could get you under suspicion. You just want to inconvenience them enough that they fix their account)

Good luck - odd problem indeed.

If I log into googlemail.com, it just redirects me to my gmail account. 
 
It's really incredible that neither Amazon or Apple send a confirmation email to open an account. I had thought that was just, well y'know, standard. So I can basically open an Amazon account using anyone's email address. I could use it for various nefarious activities such as trolling authors with abusive reviews etc...
 
Actually I was able to get into their Amazon.co.uk account. I just clicked the "forgot password" link and requested a password reset. They sent an email which came to my gmail account and I changed the password. I got in there,  and unconnected their tablet device which they'd linked to the account. So they won't be able to download any more apps onto their device from Amazon, and they won't be able to log into Amazon.co.uk to see what the problem is. There was also a credit card in the account, some guy in Cheshire with a different name to the name on the Amazon account. That made me feel a little uneasy, I could have had some fun with it if I'd been "that" kind of person. But I deleted it from the account. 
 
I feel a little bad because it looks like someone had opened an Amazon account for their kid to download apps, and now that kid is going to be frustrated that she can't download anything.
 
I'm still confused about how names work in the "to" field of emails you get. If I get an email from Amazon and this is in the "to" field: 
 
TheirName < myemail@googlemail.com>
 
Then where does TheirName come from? Is it taken from the name they entered into their email profile when they opened the account? Or is the name taken from their Amazon account? I really don't understand how it works. 

Hi,
 
I have issues with the Amazon in the UK ... for some reason, I can not buy anything in there, because they reject the card over and over again, regardless of any other purchases on the same day, for example.
 
So I bought some CD's, 4 of them were fine (one from Austria) and the one from the UK, didn't make it.
 
Columbia Credit Union has no idea what the problem is. Amazon won't tell them, and even the Credit Union can not reach anyone at Amazon to find out. I'm to the point, that if I want to buy anything in England, I have to get some folks from here to get it for me ... because this is getting ridiculous.
 
Supposedly, there are security reasons, why they do not want to deal with international this and that ... and I screamed at someone that this was a bastardization to favor corporate strategies and not consumer strategies, and that I hoped that Amazon took a dive into the ocean and lose its business because a bunch of morons do not know what they are doing and they are throwing away customers.
 
I get tired of the BS ... and that's when you know it's time to go somewhere else ... these bastards do not deserve the business and need to lose more ... until they learn or die!
 
I can only hope that Strummy, or someone else over there can get these things for me, and I will send a money order ahead of time for it plus a nice cup of coffee or equivalent!

Hey Pedro, you may want to avoid posting your actual email address.  Bots WILL scrape it and spam you.  Just replace the ampersand with the word " AT " and the period with the word " DOT " and you should be ok.

I hope this is sorted out Sharke. You can get in touch with Amazon and possibly Apple but good luck with Google... however, if you find you need to, my SIL, my grand daughter's dad works for Google and has for about 10 years. I imagine he can get a name and phone number for you if you need it. I'll be glad to ask if the problem doesn't go away.
Good luck,
It's always something isn't it.
J

Moshkito
Hi,
 
I have issues with the Amazon in the UK ... for some reason, I can not buy anything in there, because they reject the card over and over again, regardless of any other purchases on the same day, for example.
 
So I bought some CD's, 4 of them were fine (one from Austria) and the one from the UK, didn't make it.
 
Columbia Credit Union has no idea what the problem is. Amazon won't tell them, and even the Credit Union can not reach anyone at Amazon to find out. I'm to the point, that if I want to buy anything in England, I have to get some folks from here to get it for me ... because this is getting ridiculous.
 
Supposedly, there are security reasons, why they do not want to deal with international this and that ... and I screamed at someone that this was a bastardization to favor corporate strategies and not consumer strategies, and that I hoped that Amazon took a dive into the ocean and lose its business because a bunch of morons do not know what they are doing and they are throwing away customers.
 
I get tired of the BS ... and that's when you know it's time to go somewhere else ... these bastards do not deserve the business and need to lose more ... until they learn or die!
 
I can only hope that Strummy, or someone else over there can get these things for me, and I will send a money order ahead of time for it plus a nice cup of coffee or equivalent!

I recently had a problem donating to a UK based charity with my Chase debit card. Just wouldn't accept it on the website. So I called Chase and it turns out that some kind of automatic warning flag had triggered when trying to pay for something overseas, and I had to contact them in order to enable the payment. A total PITA but I did get it sorted out reasonably quickly. 
 
As for Amazon, I've heard people say that they got around that problem by temporarily changing their home country in their profile settings to the country in question. I have no idea how true this is. 

drewfx1
Something else to consider (seriously this time):
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email_spoofing

I experienced something like that recently which was really bizarre. Every now and then I'll get some weird spam email from someone I know that has some BS spam link in it and seems to be addressed to everyone in their contact list (and then you invariably get an apology email from them later saying "sorry everyone, I seem to have gotten hacked"). 
 
Well a couple of weeks ago I got one which appeared to be from my friend Dave. It was CC'd to what looked like all of his contacts (I know because he has a lot of Israeli contacts), but the "from" field had Dave's full name followed by the email address of another friend of mine, Ali. I mean in terms of spoofing that's a pretty weird thing to do, to use two different people for the address. 

slartabartfast
OK now you've done it Ollie. By changing the password on account that was not yours, you have locked out the legitimate owner, who if he is not a crook trying to impersonate you, will now assume that you are a crook trying to highjack his account. You should hear from someone at Amazon soon. 

 
That's certainly possible, however if Amazon want to contact me I'll be more than willing to give them an earful