BitDefender’s Spam Omelette 24 Spotlights Medical Spam as Top Spam Trend In Weekly Analysis of E-Threats
Week 24: Medical spam dominates Spam Omelette in new spam campaigns using colorful images and forged newsletters
Medical spam has been identified as the top spam trend in Spam Omelette 24, BitDefender’s weekly review on spam and the latest industry trends. Spam Omelette is part of MalwareCity.com, which is supported by BitDefender®.
In week 24 of Spam Omelette, the top spam words include:
1. MEET WEBMD, MEDICINE DOCTOR – Ranking first in this week's Spam Omelette, are new spam campaigns from WebMD, created by Canadian Pharmacy. Re-branded as 911 Pfizer, the online medicine company has changed the look of its spam messages from text messages seemingly sent from a friend to colorful messages with images including alt tag attributes.
2. PRIVACY URLs – The word “PRIVACY” ranks second in Spam Omelette 24 and has been linked with the Canadian Pharmacy spam wave. The word “PRIVACY” has been identified in messages impersonating legitimate newsletters with forged headers. The messages have identical email addresses in the sender and recipient fields. Moreover, the links in the newsletter lead users to a fake website resembling www.pfizer.com.
3. UNSUBSCRIBE– Ranking third in this week's Spam Omelette, the word "UNSUBSCRIBE" has been identified in spam messages disguised as newsletters. A majority of the messages with fake unsubscribe links were sent by Canadian Pharmacy and PowerGain+ online medicine stores.
4. CLICK – Ranking fourth in this week’s Spam Omelette, the word “CLICK” has been identified in spam messages promoting OEM software at substantially reduced prices.
5. PLEASE – The word “PLEASE” ranks last on Spam Omelette this week and is found in unsolicited messages impersonating a legitimate announcement from Abbey Bank. The message tricks users into disclosing sensitive e-banking credentials by informing the user they have received a message and asks them to log into the system using their login credentials. Once this is done, a third party withdraws money from the account.
To read the entire Spam Omelette # 24, please visit MalwareCity.com.
To create Spam Omelette, BitDefender analyzes approximately 7 million spam messages collected through BitDefender's worldwide network of “honey pots.” A honey pot is an e-mail address that is only used to collect spam. The large number of analyzed messages and the global distribution of honey pots ensure reliable results.
The resulting map provides visual cues for understanding what the new trends in spam messages are, while providing significant insight to researchers on the current spam campaigns.
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