Financial Meltdown Increases Spam Production, Says Bitdefender

As per the anti-spam experts at BitDefender, the world economy could suffer a loss of $2.8 Trillion in the current economic downturn. They also maintained that the spamming sector could make profits during October 2008.

The experts at the anti spam solution provider BitDefender asserted that the global financial meltdown had triggered off an alarming rise in the output of spam after the mid-September crash of AIG, Bank of America and Lehman Brothers Bank, as reported by MarketWatch on October 30, 2008.

Security analysts further commented that with the stock markets falling across the world, spammers had tried to attract online users by pushing services that promise to remove or leverage liabilities, mortgages, and other financial or loan commitments, giving unsolicited email receivers a hope of getting over the worldwide meltdown.

Giving an example of the spam wave started by spammers, security experts and security investigators at BitDefender stated that an upsurge in spam directed at the American people promoted the services of a firm supposedly volunteering to stop home foreclosures. The email also talked about the recent bailout plan declared by the President Bush.

Besides this, BitDefender cited the instance of a template, allegedly utilized before the downturn, along with other spam drives carrying financial advertisements that gained considerable volume in October 2008. Normally restricted to one message or subject line, the emails led the users, namely the email receivers, across the net to different sites, majority of which were supposedly involved in phishing scams.

Meanwhile, spam emails transmitted during October 2008 exploited the financial crisis as easy bait for pushing narcotics, pirated software or copies.

Spammers are capitalizing on the existing economic crisis and consumers' concerns by directing spam towards those people who are seeking not only more details about the meltdown, but also towards those trying to improve their present economic condition, alleged BitDefender's Head of Antispam Research, Vlad Valceanu, as reported by MarketWatch on October 30, 2008 .

Valceanu added that it was vital for users to beware of the messages they got and the ads they had selected to open.

Related article: Finjan Brings Out Report on Web Malware

» SPAMfighter News - 11/13/2008