Recent SPAM trends and predictions for SPAM in 2009 - McAfee

McAfee announced its 2009 threat predictions. The top trend to emerge for 2009 is the continued exploitation of the financial crisis to scam users with fake financial transactions services, fake investment firms, and fake legal services. The report examines the accuracy of last year's predictions and provides new insight as to where computer security threats are headed this year.

"Computer users face a dangerous one-two punch today," said Jeff Green, senior vice president of McAfee(R) Avert(R) Labs, McAfee's research group. "The current economic crisis is delivering a blow to our financial well-being, while malware authors are taking advantage of our distraction to deliver a roundhouse strike."

The report examines the key spam trends over the past few months and forecasts future spam trends that might arise in early 2009. The report also offers statistics and visuals depicting these trends. Some snapshots from the report enclosed:

2008 Trends:

• In 2008, spammers leveraged the race for the US presidency and growing unemployment rates to generate attacks disguised as “Obama videos” or links to low-cost diplomas
  
  
• Spam advertising credit cards, credit checks or dealing with bad credit has recently increased, particularly around the holidays
  
  
• The McColo bust initially caused a 65% decrease in global spam and spam levels are still not back to normal

2009 Predictions:

• In 2009, spammers will increasingly abuse the free webhosting/blogging abilities that don’t require the purchase of a domain name
  
  
• Corporate blackmailing will increase in 2009, with sensitive personal and company information being sold in greater quantities on the black market
  
  
• Do-it-yourself home business scams will offer new bait for the unemployed
  
  
• Hosting companies will be set up in countries eager to replace the spammers formerly hosted by McColo

McAfee Threat Predictions for 2009:

Threats Hide in the Cloud

Miscreants have also transitioned to the Internet "cloud" as their main delivery vehicle and take advantage of the attractions of Web 2.0. McAfee expects this trend to continue throughout 2009, eventually displacing more traditional vectors of malware distribution.


Personalized Threats Speak Your Language

Threats will continue to take evasive action against security measures. One example is the existence of single-use binary files, which are an attacker's equivalent of a single-use credit card number used by consumers when shopping online. These binaries help to create a vast sea of threats, which will make it harder for victims to describe their assailants, and make it harder for defenders to catch them.

Additionally, McAfee expects to see the continued expansion of malware in languages other than English. Cybercriminals have come to realize that by diversifying into a global market they can access even larger pools of valuable identity and confidential information.


Malware Targets Consumer Devices

McAfee expects increased attacks involving USB sticks and flash-memory devices used in cameras, picture frames, and other consumer electronics. This trend will continue due to the almost unregulated use of flash storage across enterprise environments as well as their popularity among consumers.


The Rogue Web and Malvertising

Last year McAfee also saw the malware underground use mainstream practices in an effort to "sell" software that was either misleading or outright fraudulent. McAfee expects this trend to continue as cybercriminals still see a lucrative market in this area.


McColo: The Effects of a Takedown

Spam traffic took a tremendous dive in volume when ISPs pulled the plug on spam host McColo Corp., the source of up to 60 percent of worldwide spam. In 2009, we will see a continued shift in organizations, from passive support of law enforcement to an active role of working collaboratively with ISPs and global Internet entities such as ICANN. Together, these organizations will shine the public light on these malicious actors and shut down their access to network and systems infrastructure.