William Laughlin
Level 2 (171 points)
Mac OS X

Q: It Seems Someone has signed into facetime using my email address

A very strange string of events happened this morning involving FaceTime and iMessage.

 

Before I go through explaining what happened today I will list my devices so it's easy to see why I had concern.

 

iMac - Named Will's iMac   (obtained in september of '11. set up Facetime with my gmail account. messages app set up in beta when it was available. still on Lion)

Macbook Pro - Named Will's Macbook Pro (obtained in september '11 originally set up facetime and messages with gmail, upgraded to Mountain Lion so gmail and phone number are tied to both accounts)

iPad 3 - Named Will's iPad (obtained on release day ios6 set up with phone number and gmail)

iPhone 5 - Named Will's iPhone (obtained release day ios6 set up with phone number and gmail)

 

I woke up to my alarm this morning on my iPhone, shut it off and an alert popped up saying the following: Email Added to "iMac"  "iMac" is now using xxxx@gmail.com for FaceTime.  I thought well that is strange because 1) it should say Will's iMac since that is the name of the computer, and 2) FaceTime has been set up on my iMac for a year.

 

I got up and went out to my Macbook Pro and woke it from sleep to see an alert with the iMessage icon and the message Email Added to "iMac"  "iMac" is now using xxxx@gmail.com for FaceTime. 

 

Go downstairs to my iMac and wake it from sleep to find an alert from iMessage that I must enter my Apple ID. So I did and it accepted it without error.

I verified that my iMac's name is indeed Will's iMac.

 

I went back upstairs to my Macbook and decided to try and facetime myself in case someone else was using my email address on another machine, I thought maybe it would ring on their computer and they would answer. As soon as I did it; it hung up and asked me to log into my Apple ID. Which I did and it sat there spinning forever and finally logged in an asked me to set up what accounts I want associated with FaceTime like it was the first time I ever set it up. So I set my Number and my Email address to use facetime and it logged in.

 

I got an alert on my iPhone that says Phone Number Added to "Will's Macbook Pro"  "Will's Macbook Pro" is now using +1 (XXX) XXX-XXXX for FaceTime.

 

I got the same message on my iPad along with the first message about "iMac" using my email address. However if you notice when I messed with my Macbook it actually used the name of the computer which is Will's Macbook Pro not just Macbook Pro.

 

I checked my iPhone's Settings and it showed that a couple of email addresses where associated with iMessage and FaceTime that I didn't care to have associated with either of them so I disabled all email addresses and then turned one back on. I got an alert on my iPad, and Macbook that stated

Email Added to "Will's iPhone"  "Will's iPhone" is now using xxxx@gmail.com for FaceTime.

Again it used the device name that I expected it to.

 

So from all of this it looks like to me that someone used my gmail address to sign into FaceTime on another computer that is not mine.

Has anyone experienced anything like this before? Should I be concerned? Would there be any way to find out what devices my email address is linked to?

I thought about calling Apple but not sure anything would get done, or they would give up any info. However I am highly concerened, because of the story a month or so ago about the reporter who was hacked into and all of his devices wiped. There really is no cause for me to be elaborately hacked into since I am a "normal joe", but it's not impossible that it could happen either. I am definitely not the paranoid type when it comes to the internet, but these series of events got me thinking that something not normal happened.

 

I have since changed my Apple ID password and I have finally turned on 2-Step verification for Gmail after all of this happened.

iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.1), 27" Quad-Core i7 256GB SSD 8GB RAM

Posted on Oct 16, 2012 6:18 AM

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William Laughlin

Q: It Seems Someone has signed into facetime using my email address

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  • Helpful answers

  • by Jeroen Pietersma1,

    Jeroen Pietersma1 Jeroen Pietersma1 Jul 25, 2013 1:14 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (10 points)
    Jul 25, 2013 1:14 PM in response to William Laughlin

    Had the same thing today. Message on my iPhone and iPad:

    Email Address Added to "iMac"

    "iMac" is now using "xxxx@me.com" for FaceTime

     

    My Mac's name is not "iMac" - it used to be a long time ago though...

  • by sasq,

    sasq sasq Aug 4, 2013 1:29 PM in response to Jeroen Pietersma1
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 4, 2013 1:29 PM in response to Jeroen Pietersma1

    Same thing happened to me, i got a msg on my iphone saying 'Macbook Pro' is now using your email for facetime. I don't have a computer called 'Macbook Pro'

     

    Wth

  • by Glenn-D,

    Glenn-D Glenn-D Aug 26, 2013 7:28 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 26, 2013 7:28 PM in response to William Laughlin

    Same here. 2nd time happened just now. 1st time was a few months ago.

    "MacBook Pro" is now using my email address (mac.com - which is not even used anymore)

    I have a MacBook Pro, but

    1) it hasn't been called that in in years.

    2) it's running 10.7, so it CAN'T use FaceTime!

     

    AppleID hacking???

  • by rubberduh,

    rubberduh rubberduh Sep 24, 2013 8:05 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 24, 2013 8:05 PM in response to William Laughlin

    I just got something saying "Roman" was using my number and a different email address of mine for FaceTime.
    I'm confused.
    Anyone figure anything out?

  • by eddie-biokey,

    eddie-biokey eddie-biokey Sep 26, 2013 3:01 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 26, 2013 3:01 PM in response to William Laughlin

    Not to pile on, but the same thing happened to me today. I received:

     

    Email Address Added to "iMac"

    "iMac" is now using "eddieXXXXXXX@XXXXXX" for FaceTime

     

    And, we have no PC named "iMac", and I'm the only Mac in the company.

    Apple? Anybody?

  • by ledocol,

    ledocol ledocol Sep 27, 2013 5:39 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 27, 2013 5:39 PM in response to William Laughlin

    If you go to another mac and sign in to FaceTime with your own apple id, your other devices get notified that this in fact happened. You should know who might be using your apple id to sign in from another computer (computer that doen't belong to you). Unless your apple id got compromised it is not a big deal.

  • by Glenn-D,

    Glenn-D Glenn-D Sep 27, 2013 11:36 PM in response to ledocol
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 27, 2013 11:36 PM in response to ledocol

    I believe we are all aware of the notifications and their purpose.  The point is that we don't own reported devices, and we would not have been alarmed by the notifications had we just logged in from one or recognized it.  Speaking for myself, I would never log in to facetime from another machine anyways since it wouldn't have my contacts.

     

    We are, indeed, questioning the integrity of our apple ids!

     

    I promptly changed my password.

    Perhaps coincidentally, my visa card (associated with my apple id) was determined to be compromised about a month later.  No charges, but they made me replace it.  So, keep an eye on other things and maybe there's a connection...

  • by fittmom,

    fittmom fittmom Oct 8, 2013 6:42 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 8, 2013 6:42 PM in response to William Laughlin

    Had the same thing happen this evening...Charlie 803 was trying to access my facetime...The ISSUE was is that the ONLY option that was available was "ok"  I turned my phone off and then went and changed my password.  That is CRAZY that this happened and it FREAKED me out!

  • by CMCAMC,

    CMCAMC CMCAMC Nov 17, 2013 6:25 AM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 17, 2013 6:25 AM in response to William Laughlin

    Had it happen to me.  They were using my verizon.net email.  As above, changed my Apple ID passwords and my email passwords.  For those of you who have done that, did that prevent further issues?

  • by bami12,

    bami12 bami12 Dec 9, 2013 12:00 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Dec 9, 2013 12:00 PM in response to William Laughlin

    I received an email saying someone signed into my Apple ID account on an iPhone 3Gs. I do not own a 3Gs. I immediately changed my password and security questions. I am also worried about the integrity of my account. Will the steps I took bump the unknown person off of my account? I have found nothing regarding the management of devices linked to the account.

  • by goldandivory,

    goldandivory goldandivory Sep 7, 2015 3:43 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 7, 2015 3:43 PM in response to William Laughlin

    same thing has happened to me why doesn't anyone from apple explain it?

  • by CBlack,

    CBlack CBlack Sep 25, 2015 5:56 PM in response to William Laughlin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 25, 2015 5:56 PM in response to William Laughlin

    This just happened to me today first it said my Apple ID was just logged in on my wife computer ( which was asleep on the desk next to me and had;t been opened for weeks?) Then it popped up on my phone then my desktop but with my desktop it said iPhone (11) which is not my phones name? Today is the launch of the new iPhone and I have yet to buy one so either Apple has a serious glitch happening with all the new phones coming online or somebody is pulling something fishy. i promptly de authorized all machines and changed my passwords.

  • by Ken Weiss,

    Ken Weiss Ken Weiss May 31, 2016 6:47 AM in response to CBlack
    Level 1 (4 points)
    May 31, 2016 6:47 AM in response to CBlack

    Happened to me today, May 30, 2016...message popped up saying my id was being used by "Administrator [and a chinese character] (8) iPod touch....

     

    Of course, like all of you i don't have an ipod touch. Changed my password immediately and the security questions. I checked to see if any new devices were listed on iTunes Manage Devices...and there were none. Also checked the credit card linked to the apple id and no activity.

    Called Apple, they checked and no one had attempted to access my Apple id account...so maybe it's just a glitch. I decided to post this because there was nothing else like this reported for quite some time. I'm using El Capitan 10.11.15 and OS 9.3.2

     

    One more idea about this. I did sign into iCloud on my iPad to link cloud sharing to iCloud...maybe that generated a glitch