You clicked a link, typed your password into a page that looked right, and something feels off. Maybe the page reloaded and asked again. Maybe a colleague replied to an email you never sent. This one catches everyone, including people who are good with computers, because the fake pages are copies of the real ones.

The next ten minutes matter more than anything else. Nobody at YouGrowIT will tell you off for clicking something. What we care about is knowing early, because early is what limits the damage.

Try this first

1. Change your password from a different device. If you typed your password into a fake page on your laptop, use your phone, or another computer. If the laptop is the thing that is compromised, changing the password on it can hand the new password straight to the attacker. Go to the real sign-in page yourself by typing the address in, not by clicking a link in any email.
2. Call us on 03 9028 4358. Do not email. If someone else is reading your mailbox, an email saying "I think I have been hacked" tells them you are onto them, and they will move faster. A phone call does not. Tell us what you clicked, roughly when, and what you typed in.
3. Do not delete the email. It is tempting, and it is the wrong move. That email carries the technical details we need to work out where it came from, who else received it, and what the attacker was after. Leave it where it is. If it is upsetting to look at, drag it to a folder rather than the bin.
4. Warn anyone who may have been emailed from your account. If your mailbox has been used, the first thing it sends is more phishing, usually to your contacts and often to people mid-conversation with you. A quick phone call or message to your team, and to any supplier or client you were emailing that week, stops the second wave. Tell them plainly: if you got an email from me in the last day asking you to open a link or change bank details, ignore it and ring me.
5. Check for new inbox rules. This is the step people miss. Attackers almost always add a hidden rule that files your incoming mail into a folder like Archive or RSS Feeds, or forwards it elsewhere, so you do not see the replies. In Outlook on the web, open Settings, then Mail, then Rules. In new Outlook for Windows, it is under View, then View settings, then Mail, then Rules. If you see a rule you did not create, do not delete it yet, take a photo or a screenshot and tell us. It is evidence.

If that didn't fix it

If you cannot sign in at all, the attacker may have already changed the password or the multi-factor settings. Multi-factor authentication is the code or prompt you approve on your phone. Ring us straight away on 03 9028 4358 rather than trying repeatedly, and we will recover the account from the administrator side.

While you wait, gather what you can: the time you clicked, the address of the page you landed on if you can still see it in your browser history, whether you approved any prompt on your phone, and whether any money or bank detail change was involved. If a payment was made or bank details were changed, tell us immediately and call your bank as well.

Why speed matters

Once an attacker is in a mailbox, the clock is on them, not you. They read your recent conversations, look for invoices and payment threads, set up rules to hide their tracks, and then use your name to ask someone for money. Every one of those steps takes them time. Reporting in the first ten minutes usually means we lock the account before the useful part of their work is done.

The reverse is also true, and it is the honest reason we push this so hard. Most of the expensive incidents we see were not clever attacks. They were ordinary ones that nobody mentioned for two days.

Still stuck?

Log a ticket at portal.yougrowit.com.au or email support@yougrowit.com.au. If it is stopping you working right now, call 03 9028 4358.

Support hours are Monday to Friday, 8:30am to 5:30pm Melbourne time, excluding Victorian public holidays.

Not a client yet?

This help centre is free to read and we would rather you fixed it yourself. If it has not worked, or you would rather someone just dealt with it:

The first call is free. Tell us what’s happening and we’ll tell you what we think it is, what fixing it involves, and what it’ll cost — before anything is charged. If it turns out to be a five-minute thing, we’ll usually just sort it out on the call.

Call 03 9028 4358 or email admin@yougrowit.com.au. Melbourne small businesses, Monday to Friday 8:30am–5:30pm. We don’t do home computers.