Recently (on the 26th July) I received an email stating that a new email
address and a new credit card was added to my paypal account. The only
reason to do this could be to use this information to gain access to
other financial postal information that is present in that account. And
this also means that the password that I used as a generic password has
been mined and collected by at least one group of hackers (and not the
good kind)
There is another person who explained the exact set of things that
happened to him (https://medium.com/p/24eb09e026dd ), and after reading
it we realized that loosing your password is more about scamming and
social engineering than a lone nerd hacking away at some obscure
computer screen :):).

This was alarming enough to give me motivation enough to move to a
password manager to start generating and saving/syncing passwords
instead of using one password and using my brain to remember the
different permutations and combinations for each of the accounts.

I have started using KeePass (free app on ALL platforms
(windows/linux/mac and ios/android) ) and following are the points that
one should know about it:
1. It can generate and store all the passwords that are stored in an
encrypted file/database.
2. One password used to encrypt this database, and the only password
that you would need to remember.
3. This encrypted file/database can be stored in your dropbox folder or
any other file syncing service, and can be accessed by all your other
devices (through the file syncing service).

There are several other password management services that one can choose
from (http://lifehacker.com/5042616/five-best-password-managers), in
case you would like to see the other options available.

I would suggest that we all start using that and not wait for some one
to hack into our account before we get around to doing it like I did .


Regards,
Sameer


p.s. The hack that is mentioned in the link provided was widely
investigated, and generated a lot of interest in the media. Providing
the links to the same here:
1.
http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/29/why-hasnt-twitter-just-given-n-his-name-back/
2.
https://www.paypal-community.com/t5/PayPal-Forward/PayPal-Takes-Your-Security-Seriously/ba-p/779303
3.
http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/29/godaddy-admits-hackers-social-engineering-led-it-to-divulge-info-in-n-twitter-account-hack/

1. Enable POP: 
1. Gmail: perform the following steps.
1. Go to Mail Settings:
   
   
   
   
2. Select Forwarding and POP/IMAP tab: Once selected, enable POP for all email that arrives from now on. This way the old emails remain where they are.
   
   
   
   
   
2. Adding your account to TheKulkarni.com email Account:
1. Select the Settings view in the mail interface.
   
   
   
   
2. Accounts → Get mail from other accounts: Click on Add a mail account you own
   
   
   
   
3. Enter your email ID: Here you can add your Gmail ID (abc@gmail.com) or your Hotmail ID (abc@hotmail.com)
   
   
   
   
   
4. Add other account details: 
1. Hotmail:
   If you entered a hotmail email ID in the previous window you would have the POP server name set as "pop3.live.com". you'll just have to add your password here. Then click on "Add Account >>"
   
2. Gmail:
   Enter your gmail password in the Password Text box, and in the drop down select "pop.gmail.com" . Then click on "Add Account >>"
   
   
   
   
5. Sending email from "TheKulkarni" account with the GmailID:
   You can set up your googleApp account to send out emails as if they were sent using your gmail ID. This is an optional step with you may choose not to do.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   Now log into your Gmail/Hotmail account and copy the confirmation code, I am highlighting the same in the screen shot below.
   
   
   
   
   Paste this confirmation code in the other window
   
   
   
   
   
6. And you are all done!!!
3. Enabling Hotmail
1. Select the Settings view in the mail interface.
   
   
   
   
2. Accounts → Get mail from other accounts: Click on Add a mail account you own
   
   
   
   
3. Now a new window would pop up. You are just about done, enter your hotmail
   ID and press next.
   
   
   
   
4. When using hotmail all the other details are are automatically filled in for you. 
   and It should look something like this:
   
   
   
   
   
   
5. Now just keep pressing next next next. And you are Done :) :)