India's Internet base may be swelling but so are the online risks. India, it turns out, has become the top spam-sending nation in the world, according to the latest report by IT security company Trend Micro.
India ranked second in this list of spamming countries during the first quarter of 2011, fell to third position in the following quarter, before finally rising to the pole position in the just-concluded quarter. Previously, it was the US and South Korea which were placed on top of the list in the first and second quarter, respectively.
“As in the previous quarter, India and South Korea continued to be part of the top three spam-sending countries. Surprisingly, however, the US, which commonly takes the top spot was not on the top 10 spam-sending countries list,” said the report. India's share in the global spam statistics was an alarming 12 per cent and that of South Korea was 9 per cent.
As the top spam-sending countries are also the most spambot-infected ones, the US' drop in ranking possibly indicates a lower infection level, the report said adding that “this may be a result of the botnet takedowns that occurred in the last few months.”
spambot
As it is, even in the past, reports by various other security vendors have revealed that India continues to be a hotbed for ‘bots'. If anything, India's share in the worldwide spam bots has only gone up. ‘Bots' are software programs that run automated tasks over the internet.
This type of malware allows an attacker to get full control of the affected computer to use it to launch attacks against Web site. Spambot is an automated computer program which assists the attacker in sending out spams.
“If a computer is vulnerable and becomes part of a ‘botnet' community, the infected computer may be sending out multiple spams without the user being actually aware of it. In India, we are not protected enough, and people do not realise seriousness of the security threats,” said Mr Amit Nath, Country Manager India and SAARC at Trend Micro.
Unhappy milestone
For India, this unhappy milestone in the online threat landscape comes at a time when the increasing affordability of computers and the Internet have pushed up the country's Internet base to 100 million users in September. India is projected to have 121 million Internet users by December 2011, estimates Internet and Mobile Association of India.
The Trend Micro report further said that Google has replaced Microsoft as the software vendor with the greatest number of reported vulnerabilities for the quarter - 82.
Meanwhile, in a written reply in the Lok Sabha, the Minister of State for Communications and IT, Mr Sachin Pilot, said that Indian Computer Emergency Response Team in co-ordination with the industry and service providers is working towards disablement of ‘spam bots' located in India to curb span sources.