"Ed," a retired spammer, built a considerable fortune sending e-mails that promoted pills, porn and casinos. At the peak of his power, Ed says he pulled in $10,000 to $15,000 a week, storing the money in $20 bills in stacks of boxes.
According to Irish ISP IE Internet's monthly "e-mail security statistics" as taken from over 35,000 Irish businesses, the United States maintained its number one spot at the top of the spam charts for the month of June, producing 39.37% of Irish spam. That's a 4.74 percent increase since the month of May.
Neither rain nor snow nor sleet nor dark of night will stop the e-mail going through, but anti-spam filters and firewalls are a different matter.
Measures put in place to block the continuing flood of unwanted mail increasingly block other messages as well. It’s a problem for anyone who sends e-mail these days, but most particularly for those who use e-mail for legitimate marketing.
E-mail and Internet content security provider Marshal today warned of the emergence of a new form of spam disguised as an Adobe Picture Document Format (PDF) attachment.
The spam takes on the appearance of a legitimate business e-mail containing an attached PDF file. The PDF features the file name 'username_report.pdf' - the username in the file name is the same as the e-mail recipient's name (taken from their e-mail address). The personalisation of the attachment file name makes it appear more legitimate.
Spam senders will be blacklisted on an anti-spam website opened here Monday by the Internet Society of China (ISC) .
The comprehensive anti-spam processing platform (www.iscbl.anti-spam.cn) will post a regularly updated blacklist of spam servers, allowing telecom operators and mail service providers to access the information.
Over 100,000 IP addresses have been blacklisted thanks to public reports, said Zhao Zhiguo, vice-director of the telecommunications department of the Ministry of Information Industry.
A Brooklyn man pleaded guilty on Monday to sending spam e-mails to more than 1.2 million subscribers of America Online in a scheme that foiled the internet company's spam-filtering system.
Adam Vitale, 26, pleaded guilty in federal court in Manhattan to breaking anti-spam laws. He was caught making a deal with a government informant that sent spam e-mails advertising a computer security programme in return for 50 percent of the product's profits, prosecutors said.
Though security industry experts were openly referring to the death of spam several years ago, the arrival of image-based attacks has resulted in a stunning renaissance in the volumes of unwanted e-mail reaching end-users' inboxes.
And while filtering technologies have improved significantly and can thwart the ability of most image spam to force its way onto corporate networks today, some experts believe that the fight against the use of such AI (artificial intelligence) tactics on the part of spammers is only just getting underway.
Even if a judge and jury lock up Robert Alan Soloway for the rest of his natural born life, your Inbox will still be inundated with tons of offers for HGH, porn, and penny stocks.
Government prosecutors are surely chomping at the chance to present evidence against Soloway. The so-called Spam King (perhaps we should call him Spam Solo?) is accused of identity theft, mail fraud, wire fraud, fraud in connection with electronic mail, and money laundering.
A 27-year-old man described as one of the world's most prolific spammers was arrested Wednesday, and federal authorities said computer users across the Web could notice a decrease in the amount of junk e-mail.
Robert Alan Soloway is accused of using networks of compromised "zombie" computers to send out millions upon millions of spam e-mails.
"He's one of the top 10 spammers in the world," said Tim Cranton, a Microsoft Corp. lawyer who is senior director of the company's Worldwide Internet Safety Programs. "He's a huge problem for our customers. This is a very good day."
HONG KONG spammers will face big fines and long jail terms under a new law to control unsolicited advertising.
A new ordinance in the southern Chinese city will regulate all messages sent by electronic means that advertise or promote goods or services, including fax, email, SMS text and pre-recorded voice messages.
Violators could be fined up to $HK1 million ($156,000) and face up to five years in jail.
