A new survey from Sophos reveals that the US is the top spam sending nation in the world, followed in distant second place by South Korea. The US sends 42.53% of all spam, South Korea 15.42%.
The UK, France, Spain and Germany all send under 1.5% of the world’s total of spam each.
South Korea’s spam output has tripled in the last year, but Canada has managed to half the amount of spam originating from its borders – though this could simply be a fact that everyone else’s has risen. Spam now accounts for more than 65% of all emails sent. Somebody, somewhere, must be buying things from these people to make this a viable business.
The US’s spam output has risen despite the Can-spam Act coming into force this year in January, allowing ISPs and government agencies to prosecute spammers – even jailing them. The Can-spam Act also requires that unsolicited emails must have an way of opting out of future emails, but everyone knows that spammers just use this to verify if your email address is active and send even more unwanted emails.
Interestingly, 40% of the world spam total is sent through zombie PCs – computers that have had their security compromised and are being used as spam relays without the owner’s knowledge or consent.