Gemma - hopefully you see this or someone passes on the message.
I just received a dodgy-looking email from your Hotmail address. Your email address might be compromised (someone who shouldn’t might have access to it, like a spambot), or if you access your hotmail address via an email client (like Outlook Express) then your computer might have a virus.
Actually I’ve received spam from a number of peoples hotmail adresses over the last few months too. In each case its been an old address they said they haven’t used for quite a while.
I think the spam bots may be waiting until the address expires, due to disuse, and then reactivating once it becomes available for new accounts. Address book emails could mined from previous emails sent by that address maybe?
If so, that would be an astounding contravention of basic security principles.
Rather, I think the accounts have been hacked.