April witnessed a significant rise in the number of spam or junk mails originating in the US.

Though sending such spam mails is not new, Kaspersky Lab's monthly report on spammer activity showed a 2.2 percentage point jump in April, compared to the previous month and averaged 77.2 per cent.

The Lab also noticed major changes in the geographical distribution of spam sources. The US emerged the second biggest distributor of junk mails and such mails emanating from China too was found to have risen by five percentage points, taking the country to the fifth position among the world's top sources of spam.

Junk mail traffic

While the US and China saw a surge in junk mail traffic, the proportion of unwanted correspondence originating from Indonesia fell 5.2 percentage points.

“Spammers who spread malicious code and phishing mails are still looking for the best shortcut to reach the users' system,” says Ms Maria Namestnikova, Senior Spam Analyst at Kaspersky Lab.

Experts further found that political spam was back in action, targeting the US and French leaders primarily. Junk mails exploiting the European football championships and the Summer Olympics in London also started doing the rounds in April.

“In the months to come, we expect a return of the all-too-familiar spam mailings with scandalous news items about the US President, Mr Barack Obama, and possibly focus on social networking and online gaming, as students break from school for the summer vacation and will be more active online,” said the Kaspersky analyst.

> lnr@thehindu.co.in

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