Can we get rid of spam?

According to research by Trend Micro, today 80 percent of spam comes from computers infected with sticks.

Trend Micro also attended the seventh general meeting of the Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group in Brussels at the end of June. A working group of ISPs and network operators also discussed ways to spread spam, methods of prevention, and the possibility of closer cooperation between anti-virus vendors and ISPs.

At the meeting, representing Trend Micro, Dave Rand, technical director of Trend Micro’s Internet Content Security Division, said closer collaboration with ISPs would go a long way in curbing the number of spam and preventing their spread. This is why it’s worth looking at what ISPs are planning to do in the future to stop the spread of spam.

Trend Micro has published some findings about the spread of spam:
- 35 percent of spam that spreads through ISP networks goes through Chinese ISPs.
- Spam forwarding has been identified for 100 ISPs. 50 percent of the registered quantity comes from the 10 largest service providers.
- According to Trend Micro, today 80 percent of spam comes from computers infected with sticks. Bots — applications that act as agents for a user or another application — are the most common types of malicious code found in surprisingly large numbers on the systems of careless users. The botnet is a network of computers (zombies) that have been hacked and controlled by hackers. One of today's most serious Internet security problems, botnets of tens and hundreds of thousands of computers can paralyze almost any server in an attack, send millions of spam from them, and can also store illegal content.

The trend shows that as spam evolves, spammers are not content to cause inconvenience by flooding e-mailboxes, but are trying to make more and more money using technology. Because the Internet is a virtual imaging of society, cybercriminals are primarily motivated to make money in the same way that, in reality, criminals most often aim to make money.

According to Dave Rand, there is a need for further analysis of the ways in which spam spreads and how to protect against them, as knowing them would also allow service providers to more effectively minimize the amount of spam spreading through their network.