Spammers find new ways to flood corporate networks

By Robert McMillan

June 1, 2009 12:01 AM ET

Comments

(0)

Top Stories

Computerworld - Unsolicited e-mail accounted for 90.4% of all messages received on corporate networks during April, an increase of 5.1% from a month earlier, according to a report released May 26 by Symantec Corp.'s MessageLabs Intelligence unit.

The monthly MessageLabs report on threat trends also found that nearly 58% of all spam can be traced to botnets.

Adam O'Donnell, a researcher at Cloudmark Inc., a provider of antispam tools, noted that in addition to using botnets, spammers in recent months have been experimenting with a new way to sneak unwanted email past corporate filters.

Often, he said, a spammer will rent legitimate network services, often in an Eastern European country, and then blast a large amount of spam at the network of a specific ISP. The idea is to push as many messages as possible onto the network before any kind of filtering software detects the incident. O'Donnell estimates that hundreds of thousands of such messages are sent each day without detection.

Social networks are also becoming an increasingly important tool for spammers.

Security experts note that social-networking spam can't be filtered at the corporate firewall and appears to come from friends of the recipients.

Comment Recommend Digg Twitter ShareThis

Email Print Send Feedback Reprints

Jump to comments

spam

Additional Resources

WHITE PAPER

Do You Know the 7 Steps to Successful Data Migration?

Approximately 60 percent of data migration projects overrun time or budget, while some fail completely. Download this white paper, "Enhancing Your Chance for Successful Data Migration," to learn the critical steps you need to take to execute a data migration project with minimum cost and risk to your business.

WHITE PAPER

Total Cost of Ownership of Server Computing Vs. PCs

Read the Gartner research note to learn why the TCO of a server-based computing deployment used to deliver all applications to users is around 50% lower than that of an unmanaged desktop deployment.

WHITE PAPER

IDC White Paper: Linux in a Global Recession

Economic downturns have a tendency to accelerate emerging technologies, boost the adoption of effective solutions, and punish solutions that are not cost competitive or that are out of synch with industry trends. This IDC White Paper presents the results of an IDC survey of 330 companies in Western Europe, Asia/Pacific and the Americas that measures the receptiveness to Linux and takes into consideration changing views driven by the disruptive economic environment that businesses face today.

What People Are Saying

0 comments | Add new

See all comments (0) | Add new

White Papers & Webcasts

Share our Strength
Download Now

Lower the Cost and Complexity of a Mobile Workforce through Automation
Download This Resource Now!

Top 10 Things to Know about Data Protection
Download Now

Managing Mobility: Improve Data Security, Compliance and Manageability
Download This Resource Now!

Top 10 Actions a CIO Can Take to Prepare for a Hurricane
Download Now

Managing Secure File Transfer to Save Time, Money and IT Resources
Learn how companies are using innovative technology to overcome these challenges and improve user productivity by offloading e-mail attachments and replacing FTP with...

Ponemon Study: The Business Risk of a Lost Laptop
Download Now

Security Convergence Equals Network Security Cost Savings
Listen to IBM Internet Security Systems' take on network security convergence.

Airport Insecurity: The Case of Lost Laptops
Download Now

Disaster Recovery 2008: Reduced Costs and Improved Performance
How long can your Enterprise afford to be without your data? With an accelerated disaster recovery program, you never have to answer this...

All White Papers | All Webcasts