Botnet takedowns did not reduce number of spam
 Google’s Postini team reports that, despite recent botnet takedowns, volumes of spam circulating online remained the same.
Earlier this year, government agencies and security firms teamed up to take-down several botnet targets (including Waledac, Mariposa, and Zeus) using similar tactics. Also, the command-and-control servers associated with the Mega-D botnet were isolated towards the end of 2009. Botnet operators responded by packing high-volume payloads of viruses in their spam runs so spam volumes have not really decreased significantly. Spam volume dropped 12 percent in the first quarter of this year, but the size of those messages increased by 30 percent in March. Decline of number of spam that contained viruses from 3.7 percent to 1.1 percent has been recorded in the first quarter of this year. This report is based on an analysis of spam volumes flowing into the email inboxes of 18 million business users working for 50,000 organizations. Adam Swidler, marketing manager for Postini team, says that number is still 6 percent more than last year. According to all collected data, Postini team concludes that going after botnets is no more effective than the previous tactic of targeting rogue ISPs. For more information users should read original article on DarkReading web site. |
