I received an email from Paypal this morning, said  my card details needed
updating and quoted my card number last four digits ****, however
these are not my last four digits and I've had the same bank account for
25 years , only been with Paypal about 6-7 years. I assumed this was a
scam and clicked on the links for Paypal enquiries etc, but they looked
kosher, seems a bit strange.

*NEVER* click on links in emails.  Always go to the site directly using the address you already have, log-in and check if you feel it's necessary.

Never, ever click on any links in emails like those. As you say, almost certainly a scam - you click on the link and go and enter your real card details in a web page which looks real, but isn't.

If in doubt, manually visit the PayPal site (ie not via a link), if any action is needed it'll be mentioned there.

Cheers, I never entered any details and deleted the message,
and also was using a computer in a a public library, however
some folk might get suckered by the official looking link pages.

I get these sort of e-mails regularly and had one only the other day. They are fishing for your details so just delete them. The last one I got hadn't even spelt PayPal correctly. It was spelt "PAYPALL" PayPal would never send out e-mails with those sort of requests. A give away is usually the fact that the scammers refer to you as Dear <your email address>, because that is all they have. However I would still delete it even if I had been addressed properly.

You should forward any suspicious emails, unopened to spoof@paypal.com

It's called phishing, trying to get some fool to divulge their logon details so they can empty you account and the linked bank account.  Easy to tell if you hover your mouse pointer over the link button then look at the bottom of the screen it will show the true address the link is going to take you and it Will never be paypal

The latest scam is to get a text with a link. The most recent I had told me the tax man wanted to give me money!

Interestingly, a while back I received a text from my credit card supplier telling me my card had been compromised, the card had been cancelled and new cards were being prepared. If I had any questions call.....................

I didn't use that number and called using the number on the back of the card and yes, they were different. Initially the agent didn't understand why I didn't use the number in the text but yes, it was genuine and, because of the scale of the problem they had set up a dedicated number, hence the two different numbers. While I understand the thinking I still think the company hadn't really thought it through.

Hi broadsword,

I might be going to make myself out to be a numpty here but it might be of interest. I had a similar thing in that Paypal wanted me to change my card number, as the card had expired, but because I hadn't changed it (2 week crossover between cards) they kept quoting a card number as 'your card number' which I didn't recognise. It turned out to be the last 4 digits of my bank 'account number'.

Nat West, unlike Barclays, don't have the account number on the card so I got confused.

Hope that makes sense and hope that's the situation. If not, refer to above posts.

Cheers weave