Spam can't be canned until email users wise up

People are proving to be their own worst enemies when it comes to tackling spam according to the latest research.

Preliminary results from market research firm the Radicati Group and security company Mirapoint shows despite the warnings, too many people still do all the wrong things when the receive spam.

The survey found 31per cent of respondents have clicked on embedded links in spam. This not only lets the spammers know the address is 'live', but leaves the recipient wide open to attack as the spammers can hide malicious software such as viruses, Trojans or spyware or lead users to websites where these can be downloaded.

Even though email users should never respond to the unsubcribe link contained in spam, the survey showed that 18 per cent of respondents do exactly that. Spammers exploit the unsubscribe link to identify active email accounts. Once individual email addresses or entire domains are found to be active, the likelihood of follow-on spam or other security attacks increases dramatically.

The survey also said more than 10 per cent of email users have actually purchased products advertised in spam.

"This preliminary data is surprising and somewhat shocking to us," said Marcel Nienhuis, market analyst at the Radicati Group.

"It explains why email security threats including spam, viruses and phishing scams continue to proliferate. Major advancements in technology approaches that routinely achieve 90 per cent plus catch-rates are becoming widely available, yet no technology in the world can protect an organisation if users' exercise bad email behaviour."