Messaging News - June 2008 - (Page 16)

R ecent statistics on the growth and cost of spam are sobering. According to threat data from MX Logic, the United States receives 33.5 percent of all spam— more than any other country. While it is true that anti-spam technology has come a long way toward blocking unwanted email, the technical aptitude and wherewithal of spammers is on par with, and at times much greater than, those that design preventative solutions. Regardless of vendor-proclaimed prowess, spam continues to leak through email gateways at an alarming rate. “According to analyst firm Radicati, spam accounts for nearly 75 percent of messaging type a random series of letters and numbers into box before allowing a message to be sent—were designed to help identify approved senders, while weeding out autobots. Spammers, on the other hand, have developed unique algorithms and applications able to defeat the CAPTCHA, making their brand of spam especially difficult to detect. “Some spammers are using techniques to mask spam, such as integrating personal information to make messages more believable,” Bradley adds, “thus [they are] more likely to be successful.” explains Kirsch. “A good spam filter can protect this resource by filtering messages before they reach the network or mail server. Additional memory does not solve the problem, especially with the growing volume of spam hitting these networks. As the volume of spam increases, it becomes increasingly necessary to accurately identify which traffic should be blocked.” SPAM: BIGGER, FASTER AND MORE DANGEROUS By: Melisa LaBancz-Bleasdale traffic and is set to grow to 82 percent by 2011,” notes Chris Bradley, VP of marketing and business development at MessageGate. Not only is the growth of spam increasing, but the objectives behind it, as well as the methods employed, have significantly raised the stakes. What used to be nothing more than an annoyance is now a serious threat—increasingly used as an attack vector for the proliferation of viruses, phishing, and worms. The explosive growth of spam also puts considerable financial strain on the enterprise. Ferris Research predicts that spam will cost companies $140 billion USD worldwide in 2008—$42 billion in the U.S. alone. Spammer Ingenuity Abaca Technology Corporation attributes the rising cost of spam to its increasing volume coupled with the growing sophistication of the spammers. Steve Kirsch, founder and chairman of the board for Abaca, points out that spammers are getting more adept at cracking CAPTCHAS (Completely Automated Public Turing Test to tell Computers and Humans Apart), so that they can launch their attacks directly from Internet Service Providers (ISPs), such as Hotmail and Google. CAPTCHAS—which ask a user to “Much more malicious and dangerous spam is being circulated today,” believes Sam Masiello, director of Threat Management for MX Logic. “Many attribute the shift to a change in mindset amongst spammers. Until a few years ago, cyber criminals were primarily motivated by notoriety—to see if they could outsmart the filters and to achieve bragging rights in the underground community. Today, more and more spammers are motivated by economics, largely driven by the underground black-market for personal information such as credit card numbers, Social Security numbers and so on.” When Size Matters MessageGate predicts that the ongoing daily problems with email will only continue to get worse, noting that a company with 5,000 active email users should expect 900 or more unauthorized releases of private information and around 150 unwanted, questionable, emails daily. When the experts say that spam is getting worse, not only are they referring to the types of emails coming through the filters, but also the volume. Bandwidth consumption is commonly listed among the dangers of spam. Why? “Spammers can hijack 90 percent or more of a network’s bandwidth,” Masiello adds that spam volume affects large companies and ISPs the most, often having little impact on the average employee. “The increasing volume means that companies, IT managers, and ISPs have to continue increasing their filtering capabilities. Of course this requires them to spend more money and use more resources. In addition, the more spam pollution on the Internet highway, the less reliable and efficient email becomes for us all.” “Think of your local freeway or highway,” explains Masiello. “The more people driving the highways, the slower and less reliable the highway transportation system is.” One solution is to build more highways, but that approach has limits warns Masiello. Similarly, the Internet highway has limits. “What’s changed in the last two years is the dramatic increase in spam traffic. In early 2004 spam levels hovered around 66 percent of all email traffic. By mid 2006 this percentage rose to about 73 percent. Fast forward to today—spam now accounts for as much as 95 percent of all email traffic crossing the Internet.” Merely adding more hardware and upgrading existing infrastructure is not a solution. Masiello points 16 MESSAGING NEWS JUNE 2008

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Messaging News - June 2008

Messaging News - June 2008 Editor’s Note Short Takes Classification & Retention Spam: Bigger, Faster, and More Dangerous Bad Behavior and Today’s Reputation Analysis The Changing Locus of Collaboration Serving Up Managed and Hosted Messaging Solutions “On Message” with Ben Gross SCAP Standard Benefits Both Government and Commercial Space Making the Case Learn More

Messaging News - June 2008

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