Australia Number 85 on List of Top Spammers

By Greg McNevin

March 12, 2008: While the arm-wrestle between security companies and spammers continues to tip back and forth in each others favour, Australian’s can kick back and breath a sigh of relief that at the vast majority of the worlds dodgy email comes from almost anywhere but down under.

According to new statistics from web security firm Sophos, on a per-capita basis Australia is far down the list of offenders when it comes to relaying emails peddling ‘performance’ drugs, notifying lottery winners or trying to find a home for untold billions of Rands from South African Royalty.

Of course that doesn’t stop us from having to fight off the rampaging throng of malicious and otherwise unsavoury messages assaulting the sanctity of our inboxes, but at least we can blame it on the other guy.

Or in this case, one of the top ten worst offenders such as Monaco, Bermuda, the Falkland Islands or the current number one - The Pitcairn Islands.

“Most of the countries in this chart have very small populations compared to the usual offenders, but their totals are sky-high when it comes to spam emitted on a per-person basis,” said Sophos security consultant Carole Theriault, adding that the reason so much dodgy email is coming out of these countries is most likely due to poor PC security.

“Just because your PC is located on a remote island in the South Pacific, doesn't mean it's not contributing to the global spam problem. All computer users, wherever they are in the world, need to wake up to the threats and ensure their PCs are properly protected,” she said.

Disregarding population, the US, Russia and China house the most prolific spammers on the planet, and while our position jumps significantly, Australia still only comes in at number 33.

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