The German email security firm eleven releases a bimonthly report on spam and malware, based on its analysis of a billion emails each day from 30,000 global installations. These numbers are from the the December 2009/January 2010 report. See also: Email Management Lags
of
97.5% of email was spam, a new record.
1.9% of email was meant for specific recipients.
0.6% of mail consisted of legit mass mailings, like newsletters.
0.1% of email was sent to transport malware.
Casinos replaced pharma as the leading spam topic as the new year began.
6.6% of all spam in early 2010 was from "Royal Euro Club Casino."
A surge of spam promising big discounts on Viagra soon reclaimed the lead, accounting for 17.4% of all email at one point in January.
Spam campaigns are getting shorter, with new versions replacing older ones more quickly than in the past.
Spam filters and short-lived URLs - sometimes up for less than an hour - help drive the shift to brief campaigns.
"Event spam," i.e. spam tied to current news, is a trend to watch.
Christmas e-cards bearing Trojans were a menace in December, followed by iPad themes and then Valentine spam.
9.4% of January's spam came from the USA, pushing it past December leader Brazil as the world's largest spammer.
PayPal and Visa were top phishing targets, with many fake emails looking highly legit.
Access data for social nets, especially Facebook, also interested the phishers.
Trojan Horses made up 75% of malware, often disguised as messages from package delivery or money-transfer services.
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