Tweet

Spam Continues to Try To Pollute The Universe

Written by: Brad Feld

Article Overview: I occasionally hear things from people about how “spam is on the decline.” This always entertains me because immediately after receiving an email like this, I get a 200 message comment spam attack on my blog and three IM windows pop up in Trillian with random people I don’t know saying “Hi” with a link to what I’m sure is something truly evil.

Spam Continues to Try To Pollute The Universe

I occasionally hear things from people about how “spam is on the decline.” This always entertains me because immediately after receiving an email like this, I get a 200 message comment spam attack on my blog and three IM windows pop up in Trillian with random people I don’t know saying “Hi” with a link to what I’m sure is something truly evil.

Yesterday, Postini announced that instant messaging attacks had increased by 500% in May. They are dealing with large enough numbers and a diverse enough sample size for the numbers to be statistically significant. Here are some interesting ones for you.

Instant Messaging

* 138% increase in corporate IM traffic
* 500% increase in IM spam attacks
* Nifty new names for IM attacks such as Browaf, Tilebot, and Khoobe

Email

* Postini processed 25 billion email messages in May (13% increase from April)
* 86% of traffic was spam or contained viruses
* 65% of traffic was rejected at the network layer (e.g. directory harvest or denial of service attacks)

If you like stats, Postini has consolidated ones across their entire system. IM (what I think of as “Spim”) is clearly on the rise.

Spam in the blogosphere has continued to accelerate unabated. Why – oh why – do people think that I want a comment that says something like “I haven't been up to much today. I've just been letting everything happen without me. Basically nothing seems worth bothering with. I've just been hanging out doing nothing. I just don't have anything to say right now. More or less nothing happening.” on my blog with an associated link? At least my filters are working on the porn ones now.

Read this article on Brad's blog.

Related Articles
  Strangling the Internet: Why Spam Matters and What It Costs
  Controlling the Email Monster
  Email Marketing Spammer: How Not to Appear Like One
  Hosting Service Providers in India: Ways to Solve Outgoing Spam Problem
  Spambuster vows to help wipe out spam plague

Article Tags: blog, blogosphere, decline, denial of service, denial of service attacks, email messages, entire system, network layer, postini, traffic, trillian



Related Forum Posts
3 for 1 - Thats a tough job, a single word as an expression of thought for a word like 'internet' is sure a difficult one ! However, I could think of a number of them - they are : 1. Creativity 2. Freedom 3. Universe Hope this is of help.
Re: Adobe Flex Developer Team need sales agents in US - This is purely advertising, it should be regarded as a Spam.
Re: A lot of electronics spam today! - Haha... great thread here, guys. Nice name, Michelle, I think that would suit very well. I wonder just how many websites and forums could benefit from a service like this. Anyone ever look into it? Spam is a serious problem for many, many people. I imagine there are those who would be willing to pay for a service to get rid of the never-ending nightmare.
I developed a personal tool - Institute for Marketecology, the flood of gets rich quick schemes and Spam has made a lot of people equate the term with unethical behavior. Fortunately, there are plenty ethical people out there using honest Internet marketing techniques to counteract this.
Re: Building Links By Spamming Forums - Hi Paul, I agree that it is legitimate to use forums to promote your business, and to promote your business in as many forums as possible. One of the problems with spam posting is that the spammer is not interested in giving anything back to the forum community where he or she posts. Spam messages are almost always badly written and very generalized; they fail to contribute anything to the conversation and they are often completely irrelevant.


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

THE “SECRET RECIPES” OF LEADERSHIP

Earn More Money - Easy Home Business Ideas

Here's a great ROI

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.