Swine Flu Spam Outbreak
Outbreak Date: 04-27-2009
Outbreak Filters Protects Users Hours Before AV Solutions
Summary
Cisco Ironport Anti-Spam again protects customers from spam attacks launched with social engineering techniques. During the recent "Swine Flu" spam outbreak, Cisco protected customers within seconds of the first message.
The heightened public interest in Swine Flu presents ample opportunities for users to open "Swine Flu" spam messages. As such, cybercriminals and spammers are using this lure to get users to visit fake pharmaceutical websites. Cisco Ironport expects to see more spam messages targeting the latest news stories over the coming weeks and months.
Outbreak Details
On April 27th, cyber-criminals started sending spam messages leveraging the Swine Flu popularity. The heightened public interest in Swine Flu presents ample opportunities for users to open "Swine Flu" spam messages. As such, cyber-criminals and spammers are using this lure to get users to go to fake pharmaceutical websites.
- A sample of the spam subject lines are:
- Swine flu worldwide
- Swine flu in USA
- US swine flu fears
- First US swine flu victims
- Swine flu in Hollywood
- Salma Hayek caught swine flu
- Madonna caught swine flu
Cisco Ironport expects to see more spam messages targeting the latest news stories to attract users.
Outbreak Timeline
Cisco Ironport Anti-Spam blocked these messages within seconds of the spam campaign's start.
Cisco Ironport Web Reputation Filters also blocked the websites advertised.
Cisco Botnet Traffic Filters identified and blocked the botnet activity.
