Posts tagged anti-malware
Sophisticated polymorphic malware is on the rise
Aug 3rd
By Paul Wood
Recent research from the July 2011 Symantec Intelligence Report found cyber criminals are more aggressive than ever before when it comes to spreading malware over e-mail using more sophisticated polymorphic techniques designed to bypass more traditional anti-virus defences.
Paul Wood
Polymorphic malware uses variations of the same code by employing different encoding techniques, making it harder to detect as each new variation may require its own signature in order to identify it correctly. Read the rest of this entry »
Cutwail botnet raising spam levels once more
May 12th
There has been a recent increase in the amount of malicious email traffic detected by MessageLabs Intelligence despite a continuous decrease in the actual number of spam mail distributed.
The decrease in spam is due in large part to the takedown of Rustock, the largest spamming botnet, in March. So what accounts for this increase in malware traffic?
Paul Wood
An investigation by MessageLabs Intelligence revealed that this increase is at least due in part to the Cutwail botnet.
What caused sudden drop in spam traffic?
Oct 28th
It has been widely reported that global spam volumes have decreased, especially on October 3 when spam levels dropped to their lowest for some time.
Dan Bleaken
At Symantec Hosted Services we have a wealth of data on spam traffic, and crucially what contribution to global spam each of the major botnets makes. This blog will take a close look at botnet spam, what factors influence botnet output, and will try to explain some of the changes that occurred around October 3. Read the rest of this entry »
Beware of tricks used by spammers
Sep 8th
It is well known that spammers use many different tactics to add legitimacy to their emails.
Two techniques that are popular include personalizing emails and using images to try to fool the recipient into being scammed.
Spammers will often add text to email that specifically mentions the recipient. This is a technique used in legitimate marketing campaigns where a well known company has access to the users’ personal information because the user has signed up to receive their newsletter or is a previous customer. However for a spammer, obtaining personal information is not so simple. An easy way for them to get a similar effect though, is to simply use the email address to which they are sending. While this is not a name, it can have the same effect by making the email appear it was sent in accordance with a legitimate mailing list, rather than spamming at random. This can be a fairly effective tactic as a lot of websites now use email addresses as usernames.
Canada introduces anti-spam law as spam URLs become pervasive
Jun 9th
The Government of Canada recently re-introduced anti-spam legislation, titled the Fighting Internet and Wireless Spam Act (FISA), in the House of Commons. The goal of the proposed legislation is to deter damaging and deceptive forms of spam and help drive spammers out of the country.
FISA is an important step in the ongoing fight against spam. The May 2010 MessageLabs Intelligence Report indicated that, in Canada, 89.4 per cent of email was spam. The global ratio of spam was 90 per cent.
Analysis revealed that nine out of 10 spam emails now contain a URL link in the message. In May, five percent of all domains found in spam URLs belonged to genuine web sites. Of the most frequently used domain names contained in spam URLS, the top four belong to well-known web sites used for social networking, blogging, file sharing and host other forms of user-generated content. Read the rest of this entry »
Free anti-spam and malware tool for Facebook
Jan 22nd
Are you getting tired of clearing out all those spam messages from your blogsite’s comment section?
You’re not alone. A recent survey released by online security software company Websense Inc. says that nearly 95 per cent of user generated comments to blogs, chat rooms, message boards and other social net content are actually spam or links to malware.
If you’re engaged in any form of social networking activity to boost your professional or personal profile or if Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, BlogSpot or other such sites part of your company’s marketing campaign, that’s bad news.
Websense, however, has recently released a beta version 2.0 of its Defensio social Web threat detection platform. Read the rest of this entry »
