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E-mail users around the world got a rude awakening Thursday when a spammer flooded their inboxes with nationalist, borderline-racist propaganda in German.
The messages — which appeared to blame immigrants, prisoners and welfare recipients for Germany’s problems — hit recipients in California, Finland, Germany and the Netherlands, according to initial reports on antispam mailing lists. Some recipients reported receiving just a few messages, while others reported being overwhelmed by thousands of pieces of the spam.
comparison to other propaganda that can be found on the Internet, the messages are relatively mild. “Bankruptcy of the health service by foreigners” read the subject line of one message. “What Germany needs is more German children,” argued another.
But it wasn’t the context of the messages that had some observers troubled. Rather, it was the method by which they were transmitted: through spam zombies.
Zombies are personal computers that have been infected with a virus that allows spammers to control them from a remote location for the purposes of sending out mass quantities of spam. These infected machines allow spammers to send much more e-mail than they could with their own e-mail server. It also makes it harder for authorities to trace the source of the messages.
Technologists said they believe political activists may be finding these qualities more and more attractive as they seek to spread their message beyond local boundaries. For e-mail users, that could mean more propaganda is on the way.
“It’s the online equivalent to those guys who scream at you in subways, only now they have spamware to amplify their crazed ramblings,” said Steven Champeon, technology chief of consulting firm hesketh.com. “I can’t wait to start getting mail regarding that pressing town-meeting issue in East Overshoe, Wyoming, that has no bearing on me or my life and about which I can do nothing.”
IronPort spam strategist Julian Haight, founder of the company’s SpamCop antispam service, confirmed that Thursday’s blast had the markings of a zombie-aided mailing. “We’re seeing the same message sent from a variety of IP addresses, which tells me that it was sent from a farm of zombies,” he said. “Chances are that somebody with a political agenda is contracting with a spammer from start to finish.”
Unfortunately for the unwilling recipients of such messages, tracking down the senders can be next to impossible. In addition to being able to hide behind spam zombies, the senders have another thing going for them: They’re not leaving a money trail.
“Usually, you expect some punch line about which bank you can send your money to,” said Haight. “But there’s nothing like that in these messages.” The usual tactic of buying a product and waiting to see who collects the money is, therefore, not an option in this case.
In other words, unless technologists modify the underlying architecture of the Internet to prevent zombie attacks, political activists have at their disposal a perfect megaphone, one that can’t be turned off.
Said Champeon, “Welcome to the new Internet.”
Yes it is border line ridiculous how many of these things I have gotten as well. Every time I refresh there are 3 or 4 emails.
Last weekend i’ve received over 5000 of it, actually my email program couldn’t handle things and broke down, worst of all is that you cannot protect yourself for this kind of spam.
Warm Regards
Frank
Affiliate ManagerHey Dennis,
Sorry to hear you are not coming to Miami in June. It is going to be one of the best CAP springbreaks ever. Hope you change your mine and come on down.:capmiami:
I was feeling so alone with my German dictionary.
I’m still getting them, and others that start “dear customer”, or “ok, ok, here it is”, from addresses like this, [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]
I’d like to put my fist through the computer and pound em.
I’m not sure it’s safe to click on those e-mails, they might be infected.
I don’t know much about computer viruses, but if those e-mails are safe, i’m getting out my e-mail bomber kit.
I am happy to say that I am no longer getting any as of today…
Stephen
I have clicked on them and the links inside and haven’t caught anything.
The addresses they come from are infected with a virus though. Their computers are being used unbeknownst to them to send all that stuff.
This is propaganda mail, they want you to be able to read it, like the usual spam.
We have also been receiving tons of these bizarre emails! Truly annoying. :spam4: :cuss:
