New botnets hitting the net, Oz spam levels higher than global average

Peter Dinham
Thursday, 01 October 2009 07:24

Business IT - Security

New botnets are reportedly causing more havoc on the Internet, with botnets now responsible for sending 87.9 percent of all spam, including one of the oldest and largest botnets which has doubled in size in just four months.

A new botnet – Maazben – has experienced rapid growth since its infancy in late May this year, mainly sending out casino-related spam, while Rustock, one of the oldest and largest, has doubled in size since June and, according to Symantec, “established a predictable spamming pattern.”

In its September Q3 global MessageLabs spam report, Symantec says that in Australia spam levels remained relatively the same as August, at 90.7% of all email received by businesses and that spam rates are still higher than the global average of 86.4%.

With virus activity in Australia, Symantec reports that activity rates halved in September compared to August with one in 626. 5 emails received containing a virus, compared to one in 308.3 in August.

According to the Symantec report, the botnet Maazben’s growth has accelerated during the past month from 0.5 percent of all spam in August to 1.4 percent of all spam in September.

“Rustock is the largest in terms of number of bots at 1.3 to 1.9 million bots but has kept its output per bot relatively low. In addition, Rustock has settled into a predictable spam pattern beginning everyday at 3 a.m. ET, peaking at 7 a.m. ET and ceasing spamming at 7 p.m. ET. It then rests for eight hours before beginning again.”

Symantec also says that Rustock is the only botnet with a regular spam cycle, and as one of the most dominant botnets, is responsible for 10 percent of all spam, with its spam pattern reflected in overall total daily spam patterns.

CONTINUED page 2