Spam filtering techniques

Immoral e-mail senders bear little or no cost for mass distribution of messages; yet normal e-mail users are forced to spend time and effort removing fraudulent and otherwise unnecessary mail from their mailboxes. In this article, I explain ways that computer code can help to remove unwanted commercial e-mail, viruses, trojans, and worms , as well as frauds perpetrated electronically and other undesired and troublesome e-mail. In some logic, the final and best solution for removing spam will maybe take place on a legal level. In the meantime, however, you can do some things from a code perception that can serve as an interim solution to the problem, until (if ever) the laws begin to evolve at the same rate as public frustration.
Considering matters strictly but also with common sense -- what is generally called "spam" is somewhat broader than the category "unwanted commercial e-mail"; spam encompasses all the e-mail that we do not want and that is only very loosely directed at us. Such messages are not always commercial per se, and some push the limits of what it means to be requested. For example, we do not want to get viruses (even from our unwary friends); nor do we generally want chain letters, even if they don't ask for money; nor proselytizing messages from strangers; nor outright attempts to defraud us. In any case, it is usually unmistakable whether a message is spam, and many, many people get the same such e-mails.
The problem with spam is that it tends to swamp popular e-mail. In my own experience, a few months ago I infrequently received a wrong message, maybe one or two each day. Every day of this month, in contrast, I received many times more spams than I did legal correspondences. On average, I probably get 10 spams for every appropriate e-mail. In some ways I am unusual -- as a programmer, I maintain a widely published e-mail address; moreover, I both welcome and receive frequent correspondence from strangers related to my program writing and to my software libraries. Unfortunately, a letter from a stranger -- with who-knows-which e-mail application, OS, native natural language, and so on, is not immediately clear in its purpose; and spammers try to slip their messages underneath such ambiguities. My seconds are valuable to me, especially when they are claimed many times during every hour of a day.
In My Next post i will try to cover basic techniques to filter Spam from ur Inbox

Microsoft shuts down global spam network

Microsoft has won court endorsement to shut down a global network of computers which it says is guilty for more than 1.5bn spam messages every day.

A US judge approved the firm's request to shut down 277 internet domains, which it said were used to "command and control" the so-called Waledac botnet. A botnet is a network of infected computers under the control of hackers.

The firm said that closing the domains would mean that up to 90,000 PCs would stop receiving orders to send out spam.

A recent study by the firm found that between 3-21 December "approximately 651 million spam e-mails attributable to Waledac were directed to Hotmail accounts alone".

It said it was one of the 10 largest botnets in the US.

Machines in a botnet have usually been infected by a computer virus or worm. Typically, users do not know their machine has been hijacked.

Microsoft said that although it had successfully shut down the network, thousands of computers would still be infected with malware and advised people to run anti-virus software.

The court order was part of what was called "Operation b49". <\p>

Microsoft said it was the result of months of analysis and described it as a legal first.

"This action has quickly and effectively cut off traffic to Waledac at the .com or domain registry level, severing the connection between the command and control centres of the botnet and most of its thousands of zombie computers around the world."

Spam

Spam is the misuse of electronic messaging systems (including most broadcast media, digital delivery systems) to send unwanted bulk messages erratically. While the most commonly accepted form of spam is e-mail spam
The term is applied to similar abuses in other media

  • Instant messaging spam
  • Usenet newsgroup spam
  • Web search engine spam
  • spam in blogs
  • wiki spam
  • online classified ads spam
  • mobile phone messaging spam
  • Internet forum spam
  • junk fax transmissions
  • social networking spam
  • and file sharing network spam.

Spam hits Google Buzz already

After just two days, spammers hit Google's social network

In spite of only being launched this week, spammers are already aiming Google Buzz, the search engine's social network, says Websense.
"It's disturbing that spammers have an better knowledge of social networks these days that allows them to hit new services like Google Buzz so rapidly," said Carl Leonard, security research manager at Websense.
"To embrace social networks like Google Buzz safely, businesses need to defend themselves and their employees with a security solution that keeps up with constantly changing web content in real time."
Websense is recommending web users to use care when clicking on unknown links. It also revealed it hopes Google is prepared to deal with the volume of spam it is bound to see on the new service.

No Consideration From Spammers


After the tragic earthquake in Haiti on January 12, 2010, relief efforts have poured into the nation from all over the world. Spammers, on the other hand, have taken advantage of this opportunity to send various spam messages related to the disaster. Symantec researchers have found that spammers usually take advantage of such breaking news events just about 24-48 hours after the event takes place, and the earthquake in Haiti was no exemption.
Spammers started with 419 type spam, asking users to donate money to a charity. When users send their donation, the money disappears into an offshore bank account. Building off of this, spammers began to send phishing messages, pre-tending to be from a well-known lawful organization like UNICEF.
Spammers did not stop there. They also took advantage of this disaster to deliver malware. In the example (right), users download a Trojan when they click on the link to view the video.
Symantec suggests that users:
  • Avoid clicking on doubtful links in e-mail or instant messages as these may be links to spoofed, or fake, Web sites.
  • Never fill out forms in messages that ask for personal or financial information or passwords. A reputable charitable organization is unlikely to ask for your personal details via e-mail. When in doubt, contact the organization in question via an self-governing, trusted mechanism, such as a verified telephone number, or a known Inter-net address that you type into a new browser window (do not click or cut and paste from a link in the message).

Video Describes About Nigerian Spammers

How spammers work? Watch the video...
A film telling the story of the Nigerian Spammers -Be careful. These 419 scammers could be physically dangerous as well as dangerous to your finances. Victims are roughly always requested to travel to Nigeria or to the border country to total a transaction. ...

419: the Nigerian Scam

Most Hunted Scammers 419 Nigerian Advanced Fee Fraud

Some of the most wanted email fraud in this world. Lets have a look and beware of them.

Albert Valentine Onolunose
Name: Albert Valentine Onolunose
Age: 29
Nationality: Nigerian
Last Known Location: Calgary, Alberta, CA



Fri Oct. 16 2009 - Police say of the nine people charged in a telemarketing scam, one suspect remains at large.
On Wednesday, RCMP exposed details of their investigation into a $3-million dollar telemarketing fraud.


Nine people are suspected to have been involved in the cross border scam. Police say the alleged victims saying they won a lottery but had to pay taxes on their winnings. Investigators say the money lost by the victims ranged from thousands of dollars to tens-of-thousands of dollars.
Police have laid 261 charges against nine people: Ibrahim Daud (Calgary), Kingsley Chimela Odoemena (Calgary); Jebefumere Bone Albert (Burnaby), Nigel Thomas Osayande (Toronto), Kabiru Julius Odion (Calgary), Alysia Dawn Mayert (Calgary), Darlynton Oseah Omolene (Calgary), Francis Amankwaa (Calgary), and Albert Valentine Onolunose (Calgary). On Friday, police said all but Onolunose had been under arrest.
Police suspect he may still be in Calgary but say he also has ties to British Columbia. He is described as 175 cm tall and weighs about 77 kg.
Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477.

Smiling Gordon Brown

I got a fake e-mail, e-mails carrying image files of a Smiling Gordon Brown are passing online, but if anyone opens them, it will lead to the collapse of his/her PC that'll be un-remediable.
Just i wanna to alter u from this fake email which is  interesting to know.

In addition, the e-mail also cautions that nobody should click on the embedded attachment in the e-mails since it's infected with a virus that McAfee, another security firm, noticed. The e-mail then recommends its recipient to forward it to his/her family, friends and other associates.
Hence, people are unknowingly passing on the hoax alert, confidence everything stated in the e-mail to be true and warning all the people in their address boxes to protect their PCs from the suspected virus.

As declared by Graham Cluley, Senior Technology Consultant at Sophos, the incident wasn't simply something to be treated with a smile and shrugging of the shoulders. According to him, the problem associated to e-mail jokes involving viruses, was that some persons didn't recognize their other side. Even prior to realizing the importance of the situation, people spread the message to others as an authentic security alert, as reported by InfoSecurity on February 5, 2010.

For More Details on Fake Email, plz vist http://www.nigerianspam.com/419-scam/scam.htm


Nigerian Spam News

Internet HoneyGrid reveals 95% of User Generated Content is spam or malicious
websense Security Labs has published its bi-annual State of Internet Security report and, as usual, it makes for pretty interesting if somewhat scary reading.

Covering the last six months of 2009, the report is based upon the findings of the ThreatSeeker Network which is used to discover, classify and monitor global Internet threats and trends courtesy of something called the Internet HoneyGrid. This comprises of honeyclients and honeypots, reputation systems and advanced grid computing systems, all of which combine to parse through one billion pieces of content every day while searching for security threats. Every single hour the Internet HoneyGrid scans some 40 million websites for malicious code as well as 10 million emails for unwanted content and malicious code.

The HoneyGrid have information about the Internet security threatscape for Q3/Q4 2009?

Here are the key answers:
  •       13.7% of searches for trending news/buzz words (as defined by Yahoo  Buzz & Google Trends) led to Malicious.
  •         The second half of 2009 revealed a 3.3% decline in the increase of malicious Web sites evaluate to the first half of the year. Websense Security Labs considers this is due to the increased focus on Web 2.0 properties with higher traffic and multiple pages.
  •          However, similarities the second half of 2009 with the same period in 2008, Websense Security labs saw an standard of 225% growth in malicious Web sites.
  •         71% of Web sites with malicious code are rightful sites that have been compromised.
  •      95% of user-generated posts on Web sites are Unsolicited or malicious.
  • ·         Consistent with last year’s, 51% of malware still connects to host Web sites registered in the United States.
  • ·         China has second most popular malware hosting country with 17%, but during the last six months Spain skipped into the third place with 15.7% despite never having been in the top 5 countries before.
  • ·         81% of emails during the second half of the year contained a malicious link.
  • ·         Websense Security Labs recognized that 85.8% of all emails were spam.
  • ·         Statistics for the semiannual of 2009 show spam emails broke down as 72% (HTML), 11.2% (image), 14.4% (plain text with URL) and 2.4% (plain text with no URL).
  • ·         35% of malicious Web-based attacks included data-stealing code.
  • ·         58% of all data-stealing attacks are considered over the Web.

Overview Of Spam Emails


E-mail spam, also known as junk e-mail, is a subset of spam that involves nearly identical messages sent to numerous recipients by e-mail. A common synonym for spam is unsolicited bulk e-mail(UBE). Definitions of spam usually include the aspects that email is unsolicited and sent in bulk."UCE" refers specifically to unsolicited commercial e-mail.