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Spam The Almighty Buck The Internet

12% of E-mail Users Have Responded To Spam 268

Posted by timothy
from the related-stories-are-must-reads dept.
Meshach writes "An article in Ars Technica claims that 12% of internet users have actually responded to spam messages and tried to buy items. Although I find this hard to believe, it does explain why my spam folder is always full." Also in spam news, wjousts links to a Technology Review article about how spammers get your e-mail address, writing "E-mail addresses in comments posted to a website had a high probability of getting spammed, while of the 70 e-mail addresses submitted during registration at various websites, only 4 got spammed."
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12% of E-mail Users Have Responded To Spam More

12% of E-mail Users Have Responded To Spam

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  • no kidding? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Em Emalb (452530) <ememalb.gmail@com> on Wednesday July 15 2009, @03:36PM (#28707173) Homepage Journal

    12%?

    Really? I honestly thought it would be much higher...just basing that off of some of my daily interactions with people. It's a good thing breathing is an involuntary action, cause there are a lot of people out there who'd forget to.

  • Definition of "Spam?" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Hyppy (74366) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @03:36PM (#28707175)
    The entire premise of this article depends on the definition of "spam." One could mark a legitimate business' unsolicited email as spam, but that doesn't mean that purchasing a product because of the material in one of those emails is newsworthy.

    Nigerian princes in peril are another matter, though.

  • Re:They got my email (Score:3, Insightful)

    by amicusNYCL (1538833) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @03:38PM (#28707201)

    That's not irony, that's exactly what the study says:

    E-mail addresses in comments posted to a website had a high probability of getting spammed

    It probably doesn't help that your email address is sitting there in plain text with no obfuscation.

    Myself, on the other hand, I've never received spam from having my email harvested on Slashdot. Why do you think that is?

  • Re:They got my email (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Hyppy (74366) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @03:40PM (#28707225)
    Why did you choose to display your address publicly if you don't want the public using it to send correspondence?

  • No suprises. Some problems. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by w0mprat (1317953) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @03:44PM (#28707281)
    The data may be skewed: users may consider offers from genuine mailing lists 'spam' whether they've signed up to it intentionally or not, when completing a survey. This more relevant stuff is more likely click-worthy. The survey doesn't necessarily make this distinction and account for it.

    Otherwise, it is somewhat believable as many individuals new to the internet learn many lessons the hard way.

    Mind you, "but another 13 percent said they simply had no idea why they did it; they just did." explains why I still receive 'send this to 10 people or you will has bad luck' from otherwise intelligent and educated people.

  • Re:sounds low (Score:1, Insightful)

    by K. S. Kyosuke (729550) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @03:52PM (#28707393)
    Considering that half of (U.S.) Americans disavows evolution [slashdot.org], it certainly could have been worse. Just think of the mentality of an average citizen. Twelve percent indeed isn't bad at all.

  • Re:no kidding? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by clang_jangle (975789) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @03:53PM (#28707413) Journal
    That's what I though too, 12% seems a bit low. I've observed a lot of users who really can't tell you which stuff in their inbox they actually signed up to recieve versus which are just spam. Half the stuff they sign up to receive looks as shady as spam anyway... I just had a conversation this morning where I tried to teach a user to tell the difference between sales hype and legitimate information. He just couldn't get it, it was too much for him. He constantly forwards me things like "AMAZING NEW DISCOVERY...!!!", asking "what do you think of this, should I order it?".

  • Re:no kidding? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Jason Earl (1894) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @04:05PM (#28707567) Homepage Journal

    The folks responding to the "enlarge your member" ads didn't want to fess up.

  • We've known for quite some time that spammers pick up email addresses by trolling the internet. With spam so insanely cheap - and highly profitable - to send out, there is no incentive for the spammers to select for email addresses that are known to be read regularly (or ever).

    If they can harvest 1,000 new addresses in a few minutes of bot-crawling the internet, versus a few dozen by buying them from someone with a form somewhere, the choice is pretty simple.

    The take-home message of this is something we've known for quite some time - don't let your email address out on public pages.

  • Re:In other news... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mcgrew (92797) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @04:43PM (#28708039) Journal

    Have you seen the bell curve? In this case average IS median.

  • Re:Lately... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Dragonslicer (991472) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @04:54PM (#28708139)
    If I remember correctly, the purpose of those emails is to try to confuse Bayesian filters.

  • Re:Lately... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Phroggy (441) <slashdot3@nOSPAm.phroggy.com> on Wednesday July 15 2009, @04:56PM (#28708173) Homepage

    Every so often I go through my spam folder, it's pretty funny. I've noticed lately that a lot of them don't even have links, it's like they're just trying to annoy us. For example, I received this yesterday:

    Forge your huge love sword

    and that was it. No link, no pictures. My theory is I have a really good friend who goes through a whole lot of effort just to make me smile. Either that, or it's an insult on my manhood designed to make me feel inadequate.

    A lot of spammers aren't very smart. They use pre-built off-the-shelf tools, and sometimes they click the wrong button and end up accidentally sending a mal-formed message to three million people by mistake. Sometimes there's a bug in the software, or it's just misconfigured. It doesn't really matter to them - after all, it doesn't cost them anything to send the spam, because they're stealing resources from others.

  • Re:Lately... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by julesh (229690) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @05:10PM (#28708331)

    For example, I received this yesterday:

            Forge your huge love sword

    and that was it. No link, no pictures

    This is because many spammers are totally incompetent. Other symptoms:

    * Messages with subject line '$SUBJECT'.
    * Sender names made up from non-name words joined together 'Vivacious F. Baking'

  • Re:How come nobody shoots spammers? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by BubbaDoom (1353181) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @05:13PM (#28708379)
    If we can shoot the spammers, can we then go after the dolts on tv selling snake oil as well?

    I'd go after the guys who sell:
    Get Rich in Real-Estate books
    Medical Crap that people don't want you to know books
    Spray this crap in your dog dish to make them feel better
    FreeCreditReport.com
    FinallyFast.com
    Get-out-of-debt
    Send us your gold
    Class-action-law-suit for some health condition
    and any kind of exercise equipment.

  • Re:Lately... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by redJag (662818) on Wednesday July 15 2009, @05:19PM (#28708447)
    Or they are looking for hits on transparent GIFs to determine the quality of their mailing list.. ;)

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