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AOL Names Top Spam Subjects For 2005 205

Posted by CmdrTaco from the glad-i-don't-pay-for-smtp-by-the-byte dept.
JamesAlfaro writes "Donald Trump and "penis patch" were the most popular subject lines used by spammers this year, as the fraudsters grew more sophisticated in trying to trick consumers, America Online said Wednesday in its third annual Top 10 Spam List. Six out of the 10 top subject lines this year fell into what experts call "special-order spam," which pretend to be from a friend, or part of a legitimate, customer-driven transaction."
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AOL Names Top Spam Subjects For 2005 More

AOL Names Top Spam Subjects For 2005

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  • Donald Trump and "penis patch" (Score:4, Funny)

    by Garg ( 35772 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:40PM (#14360383) Homepage
    Sounds like the title of a children's book from Hell.

  • Sadly... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by parasonic ( 699907 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:40PM (#14360385)
    The topics/products that they are using must be effective because they keep the spammers in business. It's horrible, but since these spammers are in business, a LOT of people must be falling for them.

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

      by Jeng ( 926980 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:51PM (#14360467)
      No, it means that the spammers are being employed by businesses that are falling for them.

      Doesn't necassarily mean that it is bringing in more business to those who employ spammers.

      • Re:Sadly... (Score:2, Informative)

        by jtorkbob ( 885054 )
        That is true in many cases. But I'm surprised how often I hear of people buying things from spammers.

        It's not that expensive or difficult to send a spam out to, say, two million addresses. Even if 95% are blocked, and only .1% of those who recieve it buy something, that's still 100 sales. Not bad if you're selling a $50 knock-off watch.
      • no, people who spam make lots and lots of money for themselves and there clients.
        It's pretty easy to trace which customer is responding to spam.

  • AOL could really help out.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by TheRealMindChild ( 743925 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:42PM (#14360406) Homepage Journal
    ... you know, something really simple that would help the war on spam.

    1) Clean up your 20 year old database of it's unused usernames
    2)Blacklist any server/ip/whatever that sends email to x amount of disabled accounts (I would say x ==5 but any value really would work)
    3) Publish said blacklist

    There is no way a spammer could avoid an AOL address. Start doing this with hotmail, yahoo mail, netscape mail, whatever mail, and I think we would be able to lock off the "bad" senders a lot faster than projects such as spews.
    • Just seems to me like an ISP has to get permission from the user before blocking any email. It has to be an opt-in thing. AOL can't unilaterally junk stuff right now (and not even put it in a "spam" folder) because it violates some rule.

    • Re:AOL could really help out.... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by KiloByte ( 825081 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:55PM (#14360487)
      There is a better idea: do this locally.

      Set up two accounts on your mail server (example.org): aaron@example.org and zeke@example.org -- any two names that sound legitimate and sort very early/very late. Then, make sure these two names are well-published; you may put them on your webpage, include them in .sig, whatever.

      When anything hits one of these mailboxes, just block the relevant traffic -- autolearn the piece of spam, _temp_ block the IP and/or bump its score.

  • Spelling (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tri0de ( 182282 ) <dpreynld@pacbell.net> on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:43PM (#14360410) Journal
    What I STILL cannot figure out is WHY some jerk off thinks I would refinance my mortgage with, or trust the health and safety of Mr. Happy to, someone who cannot even fucking *SPELL*!!

  • Paypal pfishing (Score:3, Insightful)

    by P3NIS_CLEAVER ( 860022 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:44PM (#14360420) Journal
    I am suprised that paypal pfishing didn't make the article. I get these every day.

    • Re:Paypal pfishing (Score:5, Funny)

      by greysky ( 136732 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @04:24PM (#14360682)
      I haven't seen any of these. But I have had to re-enter all my financial info into paypal about a hundred times this year.
    • My mother in law likes to send cash in the mail (wrapped in tinfoil, no less). We were wondering out loud if we could get her to stop. She seems incapable of using a check, though she must have an account. I wondered aloud if we should explain PayPal to her, but then I wondered if she'd fall for those spams. Since PayPal spam is probably more frequent than people stealing USPS mail, we resigned ourselves to receiving cash (unrequested) for birthdays and holidays.

  • Bad memory ? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by ultranova ( 717540 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:45PM (#14360424)

    From the article:

    For example, this year's list features "your mortgage application is ready," another claims to have sent "you to the wrong site," and others simply say "thank you" or "re:," as if they are responding to the recipient.

    How can anyone possibly fall for these ? I have the worst memory of anyone I know (or remember ;), and I have no trouble remembering if I have any bending applications or e-mail conversations.

    Or are these things trying to make people think that they've accidentally gotten someone elses mail and might profit by playing along - are these messages trying to tempt people into trying to commit fraud in order to defraud them ? That would be ironic, and essentially the same tactic that Nigerian letters used - could the senders of Nigerian spam claim patent violation ?-)

    • How can anyone possibly fall for these ?

      Believe it or not, the general populace is pretty dumb and high proportion of them use AOL.

      • and sadly, the average american idiot can easily see a 40k a year income, and easily see quadruple that in credit limit with about 15-25 credit card offers... 'a fool and his money are soon parted' has never been more true. heck even a 'intelligent' person can be suckered in with a plausible pitch you pay $15 to be 'included' in a special survey group, whhere you fill out market surveys and recieve $1-2 per survey filled out, the '$15' membership fee to filter out 'rif raff' so as to attract more 'marketer
    • Spammers make money by a certain percentage of people that view their messages. With the advent of better spam-identfifaction, it's important for the spammers to rewrite their messages to get around those filters. Remember, a spammer can't make money if his/her message is caught by the spam filter and the end-user doesn't see it.

      So, what you think looks like a subject and even semi-normal text but seems weird, is really about getting past the spam filters and so that you can see it and make an "informed d
    • I have the worst memory of anyone I know (or remember ;), and I have no trouble remembering if I have any pending applications

      There's a goodly number of people out there who will see a subject like that and think: "IDENTITY THEFT! SOMEONE'S APPLYING FOR MORTGAGES WITH MY PERSONAL INFORMATION".

      I know this for a fact because a coworker's code, which was supposed to email everyone who'd purchased from us exactly 21 days ago, emailed everyone who'd purchased from us in the last 2 years. We've since rec
    • are these messages trying to tempt people into trying to commit fraud in order to defraud them ?

      After having spam detail for a few months at our company when the former sysadmin left and getting to see more than my share of subject lines, I have to say "yes". The spammers prey on three types of people: the naive, the desperate and the degenerate.
    • I think you've hit the nail on the head because you can only con the greedy and the dishonest.
    • and I have no trouble remembering if I have any bending applications

      Does that have something to do with blackjack and hookers?

  • AOL (Score:4, Funny)

    by suso ( 153703 ) * on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:45PM (#14360427) Journal
    At first I thought you meant AOL tops the list of spam subjects.

    Me too!
    • Me too!

      But it's:
      AOL Names Top Spam Subjects For 2005
      NOT
      AOL Named Top Spam Subject For 2005

      • Re:AOL (Score:2)

        by suso ( 153703 ) *
        Actually, I didn't misread it, I just thought with all the corporate takeovers that what was meant was stuff like Google, Time Warner and Microsoft where showing up in the subjects.

        They all want a piece of the "AOL Names".

  • FYI (Score:4, Informative)

    by broothal ( 186066 ) <christian@fabel.dk> on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:45PM (#14360432) Homepage Journal
    Here's the list in readable form:

    • Donald Trump Wants You - Please Respond
    • Double Standards New Product - Penis Patch Body Wrap
    • Lose 6-20 inches in one hour
    • Get an Apple iPod Nano, PS3 or Xbox 360 for Free
    • It's Lisa, I must have sent you to the wrong site
    • Breaking Stock News** Small Cap Issue Poised to Triple
    • Thank you for your business. Shipment notification
    • Your Mortgage Application is Ready
    • Thank you Your $199 Rolex Special Included
    • Online Prescriptions Made Easy
    • Even better, a "You Are Wrong Because" list, from one of the Dilbert books.

      http://www.megat.co.uk/wrong/ [megat.co.uk]

    • Re:FYI (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Geoffreyerffoeg ( 729040 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:57PM (#14360512)
      Strange. Where's Doctor's "The Ultimate Online Pharmaceutical" or Vanessa J. Smith's "Software"? I know I'm not the only one who gets those. And the repetition of the same subject in their respective e-mails should make them show up on the list somewhere. The Rolex and Xbox 360 spams tend to change their subject lines...

      • Re:FYI (Score:2)

        by Rxke ( 644923 )
        Those are easily blocked, because they always use the same wordings. I guess most servers/filters block them before they, and so they don't show up at most people's inboxes... Then again, I get those in my Gmail account, (and those are in fact almost the only spammails I get, 3 or 4 a week...) which I think is strange, because if *I* can redirect those to my spambox by using a simple, dumb filter myself, I don't understand why GMail doesn't filter them theirselves...

    • Re:FYI (Score:2, Funny)

      by Slashcrap ( 869349 )
      - Double Standards New Product - Penis Patch Body Wrap
      - Lose 6-20 inches in one hour

      Someone has to try using both of these products at the same time. Let them fight it out and see which one is most effective. We could place bets on whether it ends up longer or shorter.
    • Lose 6-20 inches in one hour
      And others claim to gain 3 inches in 2 weeks.
      Either something very strange is going on or I'm confused.
  • Click here for Boobies!
  • by those with a greater style than I, but it's worth saying again:

    If you have to get sneaky or sleazy to try and sell your products, perhaps it's a sign no one wants it?
    • If you have to get sneaky or sleazy to try and sell your products, perhaps it's a sign no one wants it?

      Most places doing this are scammer/phishers, not legitimate businesses. Thus, they are already sleazy and will do anything they can to get people to click on the links.
    • Actually, plenty of people want viagra and porn. We get so much spam, because it is so effective, and so many people want the products. As to being sneaky and sleazy - that describes every advertiser and marketer out there. You don't stay in business long by being nice and wholesome. Fundamentally the whole consumer/capitalist society is a sleazy, sneaky thing. But we love it because we are whores.

  • Change of Tactics?? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Ed Almos ( 584864 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:49PM (#14360454)
    I'm wondering if the spammers are changing tactics. I used to get one spam message at a time but now I get up to a dozen messages from the same slimeball, all with the same subject line. I can't figure out why they do this because it makes spam filtering easy, more than one message with the same subject line and into the bit bucket you go.

    Anyone know why this is happening?

    Ed Almos
    • Actually, I started noticing this as well, but what was peculiar is these, of all the mail that I got, was somehow NOT being flagged as spam (or possible spam for that matter). Upon some minor investigation, the email coming across actually did have other charactors in the subject, just wierd non-ascii ones you generally cant see. I imagine this, plus some randomness in the actual body, and spam filters get pretty baffled. At least for now

  • I'm just upset because (Score:5, Funny)

    by $RANDOMLUSER ( 804576 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:51PM (#14360468)
    Paris Hilton never writes me any more :(
    • I've never stayed there, I tend to stay at the Sofitel when in France. They keep sending me photos of some naked woman, but they aren't viewable on a Solaris Sparc station. I guess I'm missing out on something, but I really don't have any desire to find out.

      the AC

  • Donald Trumps Penis Patch? (Score:3, Funny)

    by colonslashslash ( 762464 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:53PM (#14360481) Homepage
    "Donald Trump and "penis patch" were the most popular subject lines used by spammers this year, as the fraudsters grew more sophisticated in trying to trick consumers"

    Oh yeah, they are getting really sophisticated in their trickery. Who wouldn't open an email with the subject line of "Donald Trump's Penis Patch"?

  • Penis Patches.... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 29, 2005 @03:55PM (#14360491)
    Penis Patches are of course for Penis Pirates (to go with the little penis parrots)

    Yaaaaaaaaaaargggggh! Avast! I see booty

    (etc etc etc)
    • I have this great Sony DRM removal tool
    • Martha Stewart wants to have your child
    • Your dry-cleaning is ready
    • Stock Tip: Microsoft (MSFT)
    • Get 1,000,000 hours of free AOL

  • depends... (Score:3, Informative)

    by pe1chl ( 90186 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @04:08PM (#14360577)
    A listing of this week's subjects:

              10 Subject: Re:
                4 Subject: IMPORTANT MESSAGE
                3 Subject: BE INFORMED ( UNCLAIMED - PRIZE)
                2 Subject: UK LOTTERY WINNING NOTIFICATION Batch: 074/05/ZY369
                2 Subject: AWAIT YOUR URGENT REPLY
                1 Subject: àúä äåìê ìâìåú àú îä ùàó àçã ìà øåöä ùúãò...
                1 Subject: contact your claims agent
                1 Subject: Your Urgent Attention Is Required
                1 Subject: WINNING NOTIFICATION LETTER.
                1 Subject: Urgent Funds for Investment.
                1 Subject: TRUSTING YOU IN ACTUALIZING THIS
                1 Subject: THANKS
                1 Subject: REQUEST ASSISTANCE/PARTNERSHIP .
                1 Subject: REPLY TODAY PLEASE!!!
                1 Subject: RE: URGENT RESPONSE NEEDED
                1 Subject: Please kindly get back to me.
                1 Subject: PRIVATE AND URGENT
                1 Subject: PRAY FOR ME
                1 Subject: PLEASE TREAT URGENTLY-------
                1 Subject: PLEASE ASSIST
                1 Subject: ONLINE DRAWS
                1 Subject: NOTICE
                1 Subject: NEED YOUR REPLY
                1 Subject: Mrs. Nora Walters(Benefactor).
                1 Subject: Mrs Mary Koffi/ Michael son.
                1 Subject: Martinez
                1 Subject: MY INTRODUCTION
                1 Subject: LAST WINNING NOTIFICATION$$$
                1 Subject: INVESTMENT
                1 Subject: Hope to hear from you soonest.
                1 Subject: Good day
                1 Subject: From: DR. JOSEPH
                1 Subject: FROM DR IBRAHIM DABLA
                1 Subject: FRANCIS SULE
                1 Subject: FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION
                1 Subject: FINAL WINNING NOTIFICATION!!!
                1 Subject: Expecting your response.
                1 Subject: Dear Friend.
                1 Subject: Contract Payment From Central Bank Of Nigeria
                1 Subject: Congratulations! You won...
                1 Subject: COULD YOU BE ENTRUSTED WITH US$50,000,000 (?)
                1 Subject: CONTACT YOUR CLAIM AGENT
                1 Subject: CONGRATULATIONS- YOU JUST HIT THE JACKPOT.
                1 Subject: CALL FOR LOTTERY CLAIM!!!!!!!!!!!
                1 Subject: ATTENTON////Pascoe???

    Apparently I get a different kind of spam than AOL.
    • Interesting. My Gmail account (which is forwarded to by my ol' university accounts, which have been public for far too long) rarely gets 419s these days.

      About 200 spam per day tends to be find its way there, mostly

      - pharma spam (including 'herbals' and genitalia enlargement)
      - stock pumping
      - spams I can't read because they're in Korean
      - spams I can't read because they're in Chinese
      - w4r3z (HUGE spike lately, of identical spams, pretending to sell 'OEM' software and 'instant downloads')
      - spams I can't read b

    • Re:depends... (Score:2, Informative)

      by SD_92104 ( 714225 )

      A listing of this week's subjects:

      At least your subjects make sense - here is a sample of the last few I got:

      see homophobia, Brew but iron
      The finish a clansman pothead
      Re: It swim the mangrove
      on Barth, may coney
      An fall it fearful zippy
      on break he steamboat
      I just found out about her. megalomania mantic
      Re: in do no bedside effectiveness

      But then, maybe I am just too stupid to understand all the great things I am missing due to my spam filter...

  • Wait... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Kaioshin ( 893295 )
    ...so they read the e-mails of their clients?

    Let's say I get some great real-estate offers in my email account. I choose to report it as spam, once. AOL or anyone else gets this mail and they can analyze it or do anything they want with it.
    The next day I get an identical mail and it gets sent to the SPAM folder. Do they have the ability to see this one as well? What if one that isn't spam gets marked as such, but contains sensetive and personal information? ...so is this either "Top 10 Reported spam subject
    • Well... ummmm... you are aware that e-mail isn't a secure communication medium... right?

      If you don't want people reading your mail, you have one option. Have people sending you mail, and people you send mail to encrypt it.

      Nephilium
    • Should they choose to. Technically it's dead easy, whether they will or not depends on the terms and conditions (you did read and understand them didn't you?).

      Don't like that? Encrypt it. Emails are like postcards not letters.

       
    • They certainly have the technical ability to read it. As to whether they allow their admins and spam fighters to read it? Good question. It may be covered in the Terms of Service.

  • Penis patch? (Score:5, Funny)

    by EnsilZah ( 575600 ) <(moc.liamG) (ta) (haZlisnE)> on Thursday December 29, 2005 @04:23PM (#14360676)
    Well, i for one am happy to see the makers of penis are fast to respond to the latest penis exploits.

  • Mortgage / lending spam (Score:3, Interesting)

    by bigberk ( 547360 ) <bigberk@users.pc9.org> on Thursday December 29, 2005 @04:24PM (#14360680)
    For some time, I have been closely tracking levels of mortgage/lending/credit spam received on several email accounts. I am doing this because I am interested in the lending business and hope to see levels of spam correlate with activity in the industry.
    Anyway you can find my data here:
    http://www.perpetualbull.com/mortgage-spam/ [perpetualbull.com]
    Various regex are used to locate spams of this topic. Not 100% accurate but pretty good
  • question, is that "names" as in "AOL identifies Top Spam Subjects For 2005", or names as in "AOL makes up Top Spam Subjects For 2005"?

    Just wondering...
  • Anyone else get a LOT of Korean advertisement? Some of these products are so weird, I have no clue as to what they are. It's the only spam I mind, it's actually quite funny some of the emails I get. The intervals of Korean advertisement, unfortunately, has been increasing though.
    • Yes.

      If you search for "Korean spam" on USENET, you'll find that you're hardly alone. ROK systems -- notably KORNET -- have a reputation for combining oddles of bandwidth with a disregard for spam complaints, and they're outside the jurisdiction of the FTC or other non-ROK enforcement bodies...
    • Try clicking on the "I don't want this" button for a while. Especially those that link to a URL with the word "cotegory" (sic).
      (unfortunately they always link to a form where you once again have to enter your e-mail address, sometimes with a dropdown list of domainnames of which you have to select the last one, which apparently means "other", to enable the entry of a full user@domain address)

      I know it is contrary to widespread advice, but with Korean mail it really helps! Apparently they have effective an
      • I don't really mind, doesn't affect my main email account. Actually, I find a lot of it to be funny.

        Interesting how it sounds like that works for Korean advertisement, shame they're all not like that. Oh well. Thanks for the advice though!
  • I've kept every spam caught by myself or spamassassin for the past couple of years and have just checked the top 10 subjects of the spam caught:

    380 Subject: Remember the old days?
    442 Subject: Impotence treatment
    443 Subject: Undelivered Mail Returned to Sender
    467 Subject: Re:
    534 Subject: Message subject
    861 Subject: New product! Cialis so

  • The Essential Spam Quote of the Day (Score:5, Funny)

    by Toxicgonzo ( 904975 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @04:36PM (#14360761)
    In a perfect world... spammers would get caught, go to jail, and share a cell with many men who have enlarged their penisses, taken Viagra and are looking for a new relationship.

    http://bash.org/?203815 [bash.org]

  • "Donald Trump and "penis patch" were the most popular subject lines used by spammers this year, as the fraudsters grew more sophisticated in trying to trick consumers, America Online said Wednesday in its third annual Top 10 Spam List.

    How is a subject line of "penis patch" being more sophisticated? If consumers are being defrauded by unsolicited messages with a subject line of "penis patch", I think it's a case of consumers becoming more stupid, not fraudsters becoming more sophisticated...

  • Sorta off topic, but, Information Week, did you really need spread this article over two pages when the sidebar with your ads is longer then the article itself? Go page hit count.

  • and um... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by cyberbob2010 ( 312049 )
    where does aol fall on this list again?
    You do realize that they send unwanted advertisements to their own customers right?
    Its not as if they are related to AOL services either. For the right price your ad can be sent by AOL to an AOL subscriber FROM AOL

  • I always keep my penis up-to-date (Score:5, Funny)

    by dangitman ( 862676 ) on Thursday December 29, 2005 @08:20PM (#14361842)
    Always update your penis regularly with the latest patches. It is effective security against viruses and bugs. Just don't use Microsoft patches, as they cause shrinkage and floppiness.

  • I get a completely different selection of spam on my home and work email accounts.

    At work it's 99% online pharmaceuticals. They charge less but give better service, apparently. All 1000 of them.

    At home it's sex ads, fake prestige watches and some moron who bombards me with inane stock tips. Possibly morons, because they use two different ways of getting past spam filters.

    Then there are the usual subterfuges, like the all-graphics email, the emails with blank times to screw up inbox date sorting, and t

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