Spam's Gone to the Dogs; Expanding Range of Strange Products Suggests Spammers Are Getting Desperate.

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. -- Dog-related products have made a bizarre entry onto Clearswift's Spam Index, the industry's most in-depth study of unsolicited email. A whole host of canine-centric items, from dog nutrition tablets to dog-training handbooks, are being touted by the world's spammers via email.

More worryingly, Clearswift has also highlighted the re-emergence of e-cards containing malicious software. Traditionally popular around Christmas time, these are the classic way of enticing recipients to open suspicious-looking mails because they may contain a greeting from a friend, and email users should be particularly vigilant in case these increase in number over the coming weeks.

Clearswift is warning employees to remain vigilant, as even the most humorous unsolicited emails can prove harmful. The recently reported Trojan attacks on UK businesses from Asia have drawn attention to the need to protect networks against email nasties, yet many employees remain unaware that seemingly innocuous spam can inflict serious damage to corporate systems.

"Email threats come in all guises," commented Alyn Hockey, Director of Product Futures, Clearswift. "Anti-virus is a good start towards protection but it's nowhere near enough. Companies must ensure they deploy intelligent content filtering software which is capable of blocking executable files in order to provide the most robust defense possible."

Perhaps the sickest spam over the last month cashed in on the blanket media coverage of Michael Jackson's trial. Entitled, "News from Neverland Ranch," the mail claimed Jackson, since acquitted, had attempted suicide in advance of his trial. Clever social engineering meant that many email users, intrigued and shocked by the news, clicked on the weblink enclosed in the email and inadvertently downloaded a Trojan which secretly installed malicious software onto their PC.

Elsewhere, the weather is hotting up, and so are our inboxes. Though still only a small percentage of the total email count, pornographic spam has actually tripled in size over the last few weeks from 5.62% to 14.05%.

Clearswift strangest spam of the month

There's a lot of competition, but the winner sees spammers taking advantage of the reality TV buzz around Big Brother's launch in many European countries, with bizarre emails inviting contestants to eat a spoonful of maggots on live TV.

About the Spam Index:

The spam categorization statistics were extracted from the millions of spam emails harvested by Clearswift's seed accounts on a weekly basis. They are collated and analyzed using Clearswift's spamActive service, which is an integral component of the multi-layered anti-spam protection offered by MIMEsweeper for SMTP 5.1. Updated eight times daily, spamActive routinely extracts spam terms, sender domains, URL's and subject lines, which can be automatically downloaded to updates customers' email policies.

About Clearswift:

Clearswift secures content and protects against digital attacks by enforcing security policies that increase productivity, reduce IT costs and create a safer business environment. Its world leading business is founded on providing Total Content Security for email and web.

The Internet is an invaluable business tool, but with it comes a harrowing collection of threats. Protecting against the circulation of inappropriate images and text, spam, breaches of confidentiality, and viruses is now mission critical.

Clearswift enables organizations to protect themselves against digital attacks, meet legal and regulatory requirements, implement productivity-saving policies and manage intellectual property passing through their network.

About MIMEsweeper(TM) for SMTP 5.1

MIMEsweeper for SMTP 5.1 is the most comprehensive enterprise class email content security solution available in the market, delivering the best scalability and robustness anywhere. It is a best of breed solution that counters all content security threats - spam, viruses, worms, Trojan horses, and DOS attacks, while allowing companies to remain compliant and meet best practice standards.

MIMEsweeper allows consistent policy definition and enforcement, through automated policy replication. This new version incorporates a 'roles-based' approach to administration too, moving mail management from back office to the front office. This allows, for example, the HR department - rather than IT - to implement company mail policy on, say, profanity, sexism or racism. Its unique approach to system management allows for hierarchical devolvement of duties to multiple administrators. IT managers can delegate specific responsibilities, such as server monitoring, access to particular quarantine areas and reporting, to the most appropriate administrators or department, therefore spreading the load of administration and significantly reducing the time it takes to process blocked emails.

About e-Sweeper(TM):

e-Sweeper is a managed email content security solution for service providers. Experienced professionals handle protection from content threats at the email gateway, freeing the organization from the cost of implementing the hardware, software and administration expertise necessary to effectively stop the myriad of content security threats.

Clearswift, MAILsweeper, MIMEsweeper, spamActive and ENTERPRISEsuite are trademarks or registered trademarks, in the United States, United Kingdom and certain other countries, of Clearswift Limited. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of the individual companies and are respectfully acknowledged.