J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
I've just received an email, apparently from Google+; I've not had one
of these before, and I don't think I've changed any settings in my
relationship with Google. The email subject is "J B followed you on
Google+", and the email has a plain text and an HTML part; the HTML part
says

To share and get the latest, follow J
FOLLOW
Unsubscribe from these emails. View J's profile or block J
completely.
Google LLC, 1600 Amphitheatre Pkwy, Mountain View, CA 94043 USA
https://ssl.gstatic.com/images/brand...us_word_89x27d
p.png

, where the bits I've put in are links; the plain text part says

To share and get the latest, follow J Follow: link
------------------------ Change what email Google+ sends you: link
View J's profile: link Block J completely: link Google LLC, 1600
Amphitheatre Pkwy, Mountain View, CA 94043 USA

in other words much the same except the "J" didn't have a link
associated with it.

I can't say for sure I don't know anyone called "J B", but no-one
springs to mind. I tried the "View J's profile" link from within a
Firefox Private Browsing window, and I'm none the wiser - his icon seems
to be a picture of Sean Connery (I think) holding a gun - one of the
Bonds, anyway. No other information.

Is it some sort of obscure phishing attempt? If it's genuine, what on
earth is it about - what does "followed" mean in this context?

Were you reached at the email address in the header of this post ?

Have you actually registered with Google for anything ?
Maybe if you have gmail, that automatically makes you
a member of Google Plus ? Then the only question would
be, whether you ever "dropped" the email address in the
header of this message, into the two factor authentication
or recovery information of the account setup.

There's got to be some way that email address got
acquired, and you'd have to review where you've
dropped it, to figure out how such a path could
exist.

Paul