Spam hits two-thirds of all email traffic

Two-thirds of all email traffic now constitutes spam, according to email filtering company MessageLabs.

In figures released today, the company claims 65 per cent of email sent to its users during December was spam.

While the statistics point to a dramatic upswing in the ratio of spam to legitimate emails - up from 50.5 per cent in October - the figures only take into account emails being sent to MessageLabs' clients, many of whom signed up to the service because they already received a high volume of spam.

However, the figures don't sound ludicrously high. Other anti-spam vendors say the hardest hit recipients of spam may be receiving as much as 90 per cent spam in their email. The worldwide average for all email users is believed to be nearer to 55 per cent.

David Banes, technical director for MessageLabs Australia, said: "It's difficult with this sort of thing - often people don't do anything until they have a problem."

However, Banes maintains the data indicates spam levels have risen across the board. "We have lots of honeypots set up, which aren't signed up to the spam service, and they have seen increases in the level of traffic," he said.

In the context of spam filtering, a honeypot is a system designed to attract spam for the purposes of studying the latest trends, and capturing samples which are used to filter specific spam messages. The system is set up with several email accounts that are never used - thus anything sent to those accounts is unsolicited and deemed to be spam.

Patrick Gray writes for ZDNet Australia