Kidnap spam proliferates

By Staff Writer for Symantec
Johannesburg, 11 Sep 2008

Spammers stooped to new lows in August to transmit malware, exploiting the Russo-Georgian war and mailing false ransom demands, security vendor Symantec states in its latest monthly spam report.

The report says "it appears the depths of depravity that spammers look for knows no bounds". The false ransom note trend follows the recent emergence of fake suicide messages.

"This latest wave of spam targets an unsuspecting parent, stating their child has been kidnapped and a ransom must be paid. The spam also claims to include a photograph, supposedly of their child, which in turn holds malware instead."

Spammers also continued the use of news events to attract the unwary, using both the Russo-Georgian war and the US presidential race as hooks. One e-mail regarding the war claimed to show a journalist being shot.

The report notes that August also saw a high-profile attack that invited users to download a free version of Internet Explorer 7. The message contained a dotted quad URL, which alters the address of the URL, as well as a Trojan loaded .exe attachment.

This attack has been closely related to celebrity video attacks that have been prevalent over recent months.

Symantec categorised 27% of spam as "Internet-related", offering goods or services online. "This represents a 9% increase since June 2008," the company says.

Overall spam levels remained constant over the past month, with spam accounting for 80% of e-mail through August 2008.