New Strain of Image Spam Identified
New Strain of Image Spam Identified
July 13th, 2006: Content security vendor Marshall claims to have discovered a new form of image spam.
Marshall claims the new type of image spam is capable of fooling even the most advanced anti-spam software. The company says the spam was identified by its Threat Research and Content Engineering (TRACE) Team. According to Marshall image spam is a growing problem alleging that image spam has gone from 15 to 17 percent of all spam distributed each week in May up to 30 to 35 percent by June.
In contrast to previous Image Spam that uses one attached image to deliver its message, the latest version contains multiple images that act like pieces in a puzzle. The recipient’s email client then reassembles the pieces in the right order and displays them as one image again. Bradley Anstis, Director of Product Management for Marshal, says, “Spammers are turning to new variants in an attempt to get past the more advanced anti-spam solutions like MailMarshal. We’ve seen image randomisation methods that indiscriminately place dots within the image or change colours to fool signature-based anti-Spam products”.
Email security firm Commtouch has made similar warnings about the rise of image spam. The company has estimated that during the second quarter of 2006 image spam comprised approximately 30 percent of total spam attacks in a single day. In a statement on its website Commtouch says, “On days when image-based spam achieves such a distribution peak, the global bandwidth and storage consumed by spam grows by more than 70 per cent”. Both Commtouch and Marshall warn that if the problem is not dealt with quickly it could cause IT resource overload.