MessageLabs Intelligence: Spammers Defeat Google CAPTCHA Mechanisms

Market Wire, March, 2008

Geographical Trends:

--  In February, spam levels in Hong Kong rose by 0.8 percent since
    January, taking it above Israel where spam levels fell by 6.9 percent in
    the same period.
--  Spam levels in the US were 68.9 percent in February, 74.0 percent in
    Canada and 60.4 percent in the UK.  German spam levels were 69.0 percent
    and 64.4 percent in the Netherlands. Spam levels in Australia were 62.2
    percent, 71.0 percent in New Zealand, 70.9 percent in China and 65.4
    percent in Japan.
--  Virus activity increased across a number of countries in February,
    including Israel where levels increased by 1.01 percent, which takes the
    number one spot from India, where levels fell by 1.58 percent.
--  Virus levels for the US were 1 in 120.9 and 1 in 82.6 for Canada.
    Virus levels for the UK were 1 in 106.5 and 1 in 121.3 for Germany.  In
    Australia, virus levels were 1 in 159.8, 1 in 403.7 for New Zealand, 1 in
    887.7 for China and 1 in 155.3 for Japan.
    

Vertical Trends:

--  Spam levels across a few industry sectors rose in February, with
    Agriculture and Manufacturing being the top verticals targeted with the
    highest levels of spam, with an increase of 3.9 percent since January.  The
    greatest rise was noted in the Non-Profit sector, where spam levels rose by
    11.1 percent to 72.1 percent.
--  Spam levels for the Retail sector was 76.2 percent,  75 percent for
    Public Sector,  75.3 percent for IT Services, 71.8 percent for
    Chemical/Pharmaceutical and 68.6 percent for Finance.
--  Similarly, virus levels for many industry sectors increased in
    February, with Education being the top vertical targeted with the highest
    virus levels.
--  Virus levels for the the Finance sector were 1 in 144.9, 1 in 116.6
    for IT Services and 97.4 for Retail.
    

The February 2008 MessageLabs Intelligence Report provides greater detail on all of the trends and figures noted above, as well as more detailed geographical and vertical trends. The full report is available at http://www.messagelabs.com/intelligence.aspx .

MessageLabs Intelligence is a respected source of data and analysis for messaging security issues, trends and statistics. MessageLabs provides a range of information on global security threats based on live data feeds from our control towers around the world scanning billions of messages each week.

About MessageLabs

MessageLabs is a leading provider of integrated messaging and web security services, with over 16,000 clients ranging from small business to the Fortune 500 located in more than 86 countries. MessageLabs provides a range of managed security services to protect, control, encrypt and archive communications across Email, Web and Instant Messaging.

These services are delivered by MessageLabs globally distributed infrastructure and supported 24/7 by security experts. This provides a convenient and cost-effective solution for managing and reducing risk and providing certainty in the exchange of business information. For more information, please visit www.messagelabs.com