It's not right, and don't call me Shirley! (with a nod to the recently deceased comic actor Leslie Nielsen)

This is easy enough to figure out: no online service will ever ask you to email them your current or former account password, and they don't need your account name because they already know it, right?

Let me say that again:

No online service will ever ask for your password.

I know the email you got because I got a couple of copies too, and it's actually fairly well thought out, doesn't have any typos, etc:

Dear Gmail User,
This message is from our "Gmail" messaging center to all our subscribers. We wish to inform you all that we are updating our database and e-mail center.
Thus, we are currently deleting of all unused / inactive Gmail accounts to create more space for new accounts.
To ensure you do not lose your E-mail account during this period, you must confirm to us that your account is still active by responding to this notice with your account information below:

Sorry for the inconvenience.
Verification Code: en: 6524
© 2010 Gmail Technical Support

This is, of course, bogus, and I'm sure that by the time you read this blog posting that Google will have already shut down the "account-upgrade" account, just in case anyone is naive enough to respond with the information specified.

Wondering what they'll do with your information? I can assure you that it's nothing to do with "F-Secure" software, that's for sure! More likely they'll immediately log in to your account - since you gave them the username and password - and change the password and security question. Net result? You just lost your account, your email archive, address book, and any chance of trying to get it back.

So one more time now, with feeling...

There. Now go delete that message without a second thought.