My parents just received an email from Gmail:
From: Gmail Team [mailto:mail-noreply@google.com]
Sent: 14 September 2014 04:25 PM
To: MyParents@gmail.com MyParents@gmail.com
Subject: Your Gmail address, MyParents51@gmail.com, has been created
Welcome to Gmail! You can login to your account at http://mail.google.com/.
Here are a couple of tips to help you get started:
Use Gmail's import tools to move mail and contacts from your other email accounts to your new Gmail address. Download the mobile app for Android or iPhone and iPad to stay connected on the go. Should you ever encounter problems with your account or forget your password we will contact you at this address.
Enjoy!
The Gmail Team
This looks like a bona fide email from Gmail in response to a new, duplicate email that looks just like my parents' email address - except for the "51" on the end.
Clearly someone is up to no good here - but what is the threat? Has anyone seen this pattern before?
Some more background here: about a year ago my their Gmail account password was stolen and an attempt was made (thankfully thwarted) to get their bank manager to transfer all their funds into some unknown account. I since got them to change their password to something more secure, though I admittedly did not exclude the possibility of a keylogger on their computer. Could the two incidents be connected?