I have often wondered this myself, with spam messages like “YOU JUST WONT A
GREENCARD” (don’t they mean “won”?), “Morgage ref id last opportunity” (don’t they
mean “mortgage”)? and, my favorite “earn a college degre instantly” (they
presumably mean “degree”, but if they can’t spell the word degree, how can I have
confidence in the legitimacy of what they’re offering??)

But anyone who has spent more than about five minutes looking at the problem and
attempted solutions to spam knows why there are such rampant misspellings: to try
and sidestep spam filters. In additional to individual spam filtering systems, there
are now many Internet Service Providers who filter your email before it even gets to
your mailbox, weeding out the most idiotic and easily recognized of this junk.

Of course, if you are a physician and have patients who are concerned about that
Merck Vioxx prescription you wrote for them two years ago, it is theoretically
possible that their message won’t make it to you. If you’re a mortgage broker, well,
news of your competitors offerings might be something you do want to
receive. But overall, most people don’t want this junk, so the people clogging up the
Internet with the billions of spam messages sent daily continue to try and sidestep
these filtering mechanisms, and the misspellings, typos, and oddly presented words
(like “0ffer” with a leading zero rather than “offer” with a letter o) presumably offer
some minimal ability to do just that.

The irony of all this, in my opinion, is that the more spammers try to do overt and
stupid tricks to try and sidestep the filters, the less effective their messages are.
They might measure 1 sale in 250,000 messages a success, but better targeting,
legitimate offers, well-written ad copy and genuine opt-in distribution lists might
just improve those odds quite a bit. And if you’re selling something, wouldn’t you
like to avoid having 95% of the Internet spontaneously hate you because of your
marketing techniques?

Dave Taylor has been involved with the Internet since 1980, and has written sixteen
different technical books. His latest projects are College Finances and Ask Dave Taylor, where he’s happy to receive questions from readers.

Types of Spam Threats The recent onset of fraudulent spam variants such as phishing and spoofing pose an even greater risk than the spam volume clogging email servers. Spammers use techniques such as phishing and spoofing to fool users into opening messages that, at first glance, appear innocuous.

Phishing Phishing is a specific type of spam message that solicits personal information from the recipient. Phishers use social engineering techniques to fool end users into believing that the message originated from a trusted sender, making these attacks especially dangerous because they often con victims into divulging social security numbers, bank account information or credit card numbers. In one six-month period from November 2003 to May 2004, phishing attacks increased in frequency by 4000%, and the trend continues upward.

An example of phishing is an email that appears to come from a bank requesting that users log into their account to update or correct personal information. When the users follow a link embedded in the email, they are redirected to a site that looks and behaves like the expected bank website. However, unbeknownst to the soon-to-be identity theft victims, the site is actually controlled by the scam artists who sent the email; any and all information entered by the victim can now be used in a variety of ways, none of them good.

Spoofing Spoofing is a deceptive form of spam that hides the domain of the spammer or the spam’s origination point. Spammers often hijack the domains of well-known businesses or government entities to make spam filters think the communication is coming from a legitimate source.

Today’s spammers are more crafty than ever before and have begun blending elements of both phishing and spoofing into their messages, further spinning their web of deception. The toxic combination of spoofing and phishing presents a major threat that can trick most anyone into providing personal information to a stranger.

Toothless Legislation On January 1, 2004, President Bush signed into law the “Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act of 2003,” or “CAN-SPAM” Act. While well intentioned, CAN-SPAM has done little or nothing to curb the flow of unwanted email. In fact, an estimated 97% of all spam email sent in 2004 violated the Act, and the United States still dwarfs other nations in terms of the origin of spam, with CipherTrust research revealing that an astonishing 56.77% of all spam comes from U.S.-based IP addresses. While CAN-SPAM was designed to decrease the overall volume of spam, the exact opposite has happened: in 2004, spam accounted for approximately 77% of all email traffic, and phishing attacks continue to increase exponentially, with studies showing an increase of 4000% from November 2003 to May 2004.

Anti Spam Software for the Desktop The dramatic increase in spam volume has prompted a corresponding surge in stand-alone anti spam software solutions for the desktop, all with varying levels of effectiveness. Some anti spam software uses text filtering to screen incoming messages for known characteristics of spam, while other solutions rely solely on reputation systems that monitor and categorize email senders by IP address according to their sending behavior. Still other anti spam software uses “challenge/response filters” to block unapproved mail until the sender responds (manually) to a challenge email sent to their email account to verify his or her identity.

With so many different methods of filtering spam, no single software-based desktop anti spam solution is capable of effectively stopping spam before it reaches the inbox. The only way to successfully fight spam is to create an anti spam “cocktail” including reputation services, text filters, constant updates and a host of other best-of-breed spam blocking methods. Just as importantly, an effective anti spam solution should reside at the email gateway, not at the desktop. Without protection at the gateway, mail servers waste massive amounts of bandwidth and storage space processing every message, wanted or not, and end users face the unenviable task of deciding what to do with the countless spam messages that successfully reach them.

Take a Consolidated Approach to Anti Spam Although it takes a person only a moment to process a message and identify it as spam, it is difficult to automate that human process because no single message characteristic consistently identifies spam. In fact, there are hundreds of different message characteristics that may indicate an email is spam, and an effective anti spam solution must be capable of employing multiple spam detection techniques.

In addition to effectively identifying spam, businesses must be assured that legitimate mail is not blocked in error. Even one false positive, or incorrectly blocked email, can have a significant impact on businesses today. Accurate spam blocking requires a combination of tools to examine various message criteria combined with real-time research and intelligence data.

By aggregating multiple spam detection technologies like text filtering, reputation services, traffic analysis and other best-of-breed techniques, and placing the solution at the email gateway in a hardened appliance, enterprises can retake control of the inbox.

Mothers day is usually a day of gift giving and spending time with the woman who rbought you into this world, but just what kind of gift do you get the most important woman in your life?

- Flowers are always a nice mothers day gift, they brighten up the room and every girl loves getting flowers whether its your mum or your girlfriend.

- Mothers Day Chocolates are probably just as popular as flowers, this is because they are loved by everyone. It doesnt matter even if your mu is having the most terrible mothers day she will smile the minute she sees a box of nice chocolates

- If you want to stray away from the norm then you could always take a look at some of our other fantastic gifts ideas for mothers day 2009.

Whatever you decide to get your mum for mothers day this year, just make sure it is thoughtful and nice. It doesnt have to be expensive, as the old saying goes it is the thought that counts. Have a nice mothers day 2009, see you next year.