Berlin, February 8, 2012 – The turn of the year 2011/2012 was characterized by two contrasting trends for e-mail security: whereas spam levels underwent a dramatic decline in December, phishing e-mail experienced explosive growth: its share increased by 194% in December and by a further 214% in January. By contrast, overall spam levels declined by 70.3% in December and experienced only a slight increase of 9.7% in January. That put spam volumes at the lowest rate since early 2007. Those are the findings presented today in the February 2012 E-mail Security Report conducted by leading German e-mail security provider, eleven. The most important spam trend was a significant increase in so-called drive-by spam – specially prepared HTML e-mails that infect the computer with malware as soon as an e-mail is opened.

An overview of further key trends:

• The trend toward regionalized phishing campaigns continued in December and January, targeting e.g. German-speaking users. The range of topics used in phishing campaigns continues to expand; in addition to bank data, phishers are increasingly focusing on accessing e-mail accounts and online services such as Amazon or Facebook.
• The decline in spam levels is primarily attributable to the widespread absence of casino spam waves. Whereas such spam still comprised 69.1% of all spam e-mail in November 2011, that value was only 7.5% (fourth place) by January. The most prevalent spam topic was pharmaceuticals (26.0%), a long-term frontrunner and number one for the first time again since May 2011. With 23.2%, fake luxury goods came in second, followed by dating spam with 8.1%.
• There were also shifts in terms of geographic origin of spam. The majority of spam still comes from India with 11.7% in January. Spam from Brazil experienced a major decline (fifth place, 5.1% versus 11.2% in November) and Vietnam (seventh place, 4.2% versus 8.9%). Indonesia made the largest gain, jumping to second place (with 7.9%), followed by Russia (7. 2%). The top ten list of spamming countries is dominated by Asian and Eastern European countries.
• Germany is once again becoming the source of an increasing level of spam; the country came in 19th with 1.3% in January 2012 (November: 30th, 0.6%) and more than doubled its share of overall spam volume within two months. The long-term forerunner, the USA, once again picked up speed as well; it went from 14th (with 1.3%) in November 2011 to 11th (with 2.5%) in January 2012.
• Malware volumes increased by 8.0% in January 2012, and the occurrence of unknown virus outbreaks increased by 6.5%. The largest sender of known malware was China with 29.4%. In terms of outbreaks, Italy came in first (10.7%); Germany ranked both seventh (3.1%) and eighth (3.7%).
• Versions of the MyDoom worm dominated malware sent via e-mail in December and January, comprising approximately 65% of all virus e-mails. MyDoom is one of the most widely disseminated malware families and appeared for the first time in 2004.
• Spam’s overall share of total e-mail volume declined to 75.1% in January 2012; in November 2011, 90.2% of all e-mail was spam.

You can find eleven’s complete E-mail Security Report in the eleven security blog at http://www.eleven-securityblog.de
and on the eleven website at http://www.eleven.de/eleven-security-reports.html.

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eleven – E-mail security "Made in Germany"

eleven is a leading e-mail security provider based in Germany. Its eXpurgate technology, which is unique worldwide, offers a spam filter and e-mail categorization service that protects the user reliably from spam and phishing, detects potentially dangerous e-mail and can distinguish between individual messages and any kind of mass e-mail. eXpurgate also offers numerous virus protection options and a powerful e-mail firewall.

Over 45,000 companies of all sizes use eXpurgate to check and categorize more than a billion e-mail messages every day. Customers include Internet service providers and telecommunication carriers such as T-Online, O2, Vodafone and freenet as well as many well-known companies and public institutions, including Air Berlin, the Federal Association of German Banks, DATEV, the Free University of Berlin, Landesbank Berlin, Mazda, RTL, ThyssenKrupp and Tobit Software AG. For more information, visit our website at: http://www.eleven.de.

Company contact:

eleven GmbH
Sascha Krieger
Hardenbergplatz 2
10623 Berlin
Phone: +49 (0)30 / 52 00 56-0
E-mail: presse@eleven.de
http://www.eleven.de

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