US chief culprit for spamming Aussies

Stan Beer
Wednesday, 12 October 2005 10:00

Business IT - Security

Australian computer users receive three times more spam emails from the US than from any other source, according to statistics from security developer New Millennium Solutions (NMS).

While 29% of all spam received by a sample of home users and small to medium businesses came from the US, 9% originated in Australia and 7% from the Republic of Korea.

Other leading countries of origin for junk emails were China with 7%; Canada 4%; UK and Japan 3%; and France, Taiwan, Brazil and Germany 2%.

According to NMS Chairman, Peter Stewart, the company's survey showed that pain levels for spam were lower than expected. 

He said: 'People think they get a lot of spam, but they don't really - it just seems like they do. Our users come to us because their previous methods of filtering were inadequate and they needed a better solution. They talked of receiving tens or hundreds of unwanted emails a day, but their real problem seemed to be the consistency with which unwanted email arrived, each day, every day.'

NMS statistics show the maximum spam received by a single user was 83 in a day. That same user received a daily average of 52.  The minimum spam count was 3 in one day and that user received an average of 1 per day.  The overall average was 7 spam emails, while the average maximum was 13.

The maximum spread of email from originating countries received by a single customer was 39 and the lowest 2.