An Example of "Spoofing" or Password Phishing and How to Detect Solution, Beware!

Bad folks are everywhere. Beware of bad peeps in the world wide web surroundings (internet) who is trying to get your personal identification like Social Security Number, bank account number, PIN number, credit card info, birth date, name, telephone number, address, and other private information especially password for identity theft. It will ruin your financial standing as well as your credibility. If you happen to have your password remembered on your personal computer browser, change it at least once a month or do not store your password on your browser to easily get in the website. Even if you have anti-virus protection, it is still possible though not that risky.

I personally received a password phishing message lately on my gmail. Actually there are lots I received about how many millions of pounds they will give because the owner died and they want someone to take care and blah blah.. but this one is much bad because it seems true because I joined with my friend's daughter contest and there are many gmail account created by my bet's co-contestant, I presume that gmail did the cleaning. But Ola! it's one of the bunch of phishing attack! I put it in spam folder and reported to Google after it. Below is the message:

from	customer service
reply-to		customer service
to		"my email add @gmail"
date		Wed, Nov 11, 2009 at 7:12 PM
subject		Invitation: Dear Account User, @ Wed Nov 11 4:30pm – 5:30pm ("my other email add)
mailed-by		calendar-server.bounces.google.com
signed-by		Google.com

Dear Account User,

This
Email is from G mail customer care and we are sending it to every G
mail accounts owner for safety. We are having congestion due to the
anonymous registration of G mail accounts so we are shutting down some
G mail accounts and your account was among those to be deleted. We are
sending this email to you so that you can verify and let us know if you
still want to use this account. If you are still interested please
confirm your account by filling the space below.Your User name,
password, date of birth and your country information would be needed to
verify your account.
Due to the congestion in all G mail users
and removal of all unused G mail Accounts. G mail would be shutting
down all unused Accounts, you will have to confirm your E-mail by
filling out your Lo gin Information below after clicking the reply
button or your account will be suspended within 24 hours for security
reasons.
* User name: ............................
* Password: ................................
* Date of Birth: ............................
* Country Or Territory: ....................

Warning!!!
Account owner that refuses to update his or her account within Seven
days of receiving this warning will lose his or her account permanently.
Thank you for using G mail !
The G mail Team
G MAI L BETA

The question is did gmail send messages to the members asking for password and other private information? Though this cost a lot of my time to gather information and data if this is a true message since I don't want my gmail account be closed, I conclude that the answer is "NO!" - this is not a message from Google management. My resources? I digged-up and read Google discussion, Google help forum (a specific single question regarding the problem above), a step-by-step process to get the information in Gmail help: Messages asking for personal information page. Please read the informational link for important information about this matter.

If ever you have been spoofed, meaning your important private information was being disgraced or you believe that you are defrauded by a third party please report it to Internet Crime Complaint Center (www.ic3.gov). This ICCC is in partnership between the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the National White Collar Crime Center. Please file a complaint of Impersonation for your protection.