I saw a mistake in your first sentence. Yahoo doesn't have the most popular messenger. MSN does. In Romania it is the most frequently used instant messenger but few people outside Romania use it.

"Usually, the users might think their account was stolen if they're unable to connect but there are numerous reasons for this error: bad connection, Yahoo temporary downtime or even a ban applied to the account for multiple reasons"... Is it? Today I sent an email from my Yahoo mail account using children's computer. Forgeting open the window, I was stupefied when (after 2 hours) my wife showed me what I just sent her ("you are hot", etc). A bot typed a message in my name to my wife. I responded with few messages to "the other me" from my wife's computer and indeed was a bot. When I tried to login to YM I was logout instantly and only after 3 or 4 retrays I was able to open my YM, change password, etc. There is no trace of virus or malware on any computers (checked and rechecked all) but I found my children playing on theyr computer, with my window of Yahoo mail minimised. So, no bad connection, nor YM down, but a bot stealing my password...

I just want to add some other factor for steeling the password , all the technique to steal a password is based on searching the password stored in your computer , and here is important question how the password can be stored in the computer , simply by marking remember my password or sign in automatcally those marks caused the computer to store the password if any user avoid marking those options then even if you click the danger link that been sent to you it will return nothing to the hacker so if you seek maximum security don't ever use remember my password not even in the E-Mail or any account and specially if you use another computer , also when entering any password make sure that the address bar is displaying HTTPS:// ( secure ) instead of just HTTP:// ( regular browse )which mean you are safe to write your password and pass it over the net.

good luck for all and keep it safe ;)

Yeah, but if you insert your password every time then.. if somebody has sent a key reader in your computer.. then your password will be surely stolen..

unless Yahoo Messenger has changed its security- it transmits passwords "in the clear" i.e. NOT encrypted, so a malicious user can in fact easily intercept a user's password. This article, subject to the initial sentence of this post, is therefore deceivingly incorrect