I just got a random IM from a friend, told me to check out his new pictures he just put up. Clicked on the link(a geocities link) and it looks exactly like Yahoo Pictures.

Beaware of these kinds of sites, if you were to put your username and password in there, you will be giving your account away. If you do happen to fall for such a scheme, CHANGE YOUR PASSWORD IMMEDIATELY, if you don't they will change it for you, and you will lose your account. What they are probably looking for, are people with things such as banking information in their email, they get your email, they get your bank account information, they get your money.

From a friend?

It gets your username and password, so it can log in for you and send im's to everyone on your list.

Just clicking on the link will give away your username and password. This happened to me about 6 months ago. I had reported it and never heard anything after that.

Lucky for me, I highlight everything, and changed my password when I saw my info on the site!

If that's true, that's the most stupid thing since Google's 2030 cookie.

As for the new pictures thing, it's old hat if you've been using MSN - these things are coming out of the woodwork. Especially with the Java exploit that allowed the site to download applications (ie, viruses) in the background after you clicked the link, so that it could hijack your MSN account and send IMs without you seeing and without you getting logged out.

So yes, if you get a link or get offered a file without them explaining EXACTLY what it is (especially if it involves the word "pics"), ask first to check if you're talking to a bot.

And who would use yahoo for banking information when you can have gmail

This has been around on MSN for a while to, it will be something sleezy like Hi, heres pictures of me naked or some shit like that. You usually know if its a virus or wateva it is when your friend sends it to you...i hope it was a virus and not him sending pics to me lol