Emerging Spamming Threats

Abstract

Spam is the abuse of electronic messaging systems (including most broadcast media, digital delivery systems) to send unsolicited bulk messages indiscriminately. While the most widely recognized 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, television advertising and file sharing network spam. Spamming remains economically viable because advertisers have no operating costs beyond the management of their mailing lists, and it is difficult to hold senders accountable for their mass mailings. Because the barrier to entry is so low, spammers are numerous, and the volume of unsolicited mail has become very high. The costs, such as lost productivity and fraud, are borne by the public and by Internet service providers, which have been forced to add extra capacity to cope with the deluge. Spamming is universally reviled, and has been the subject of legislation in many jurisdictions. Spamming is now considered to be a serious threat to the Internet and is posing a serious threat to both ISP and users' resource. Service providers are under mounting pressure to prevent, monitor and lessen spam attacks directed toward their customers and their infrastructure. The Internet is part of the serious national infrastructure. Attacks that are seen everyday on the Internet include direct attacks, remote reflective attacks, worms, and viruses. Emerging classes of messaging abuse in the mobile environment have led to neologisms like SMishing, or SMS phishing. A SMiShing attack could introduce viruses or other malware to the network or add massive charges to corporate cell phone bills.