India ranked 4th in spam e-mails export: Microsoft Report

India was ranked fourth in a Microsoft report in the list of the countries sending out spam e-mails. Microsoft on 28 February 2014 released security intelligence report saying that spam emails contents are malicious and carries advertisements for pharma products and sexually explicit material. The report is based on the survey conducted during January to June 2013.

In the list of the Microsoft report, India has followed three nations namely
• US topped the list for sending maximum number of Botnet spam
• China
• The UK

Cyber criminals share out malicious software or malware that can turn a computer into a bot also known as a zombie or robot. Zombie or robot automates the tasks of the computer over the internet without being in knowledge of the PC (personal computer) owner.

Governments and industry response team can understand the magnitude of security problems by determining the originating place of bonet spam.

India was also victim of a number of cybercrimes and ranked fifth in terms of malware encounters. The encounter rate increased slightly from 29.31 percent in the first quarter to 29.44 percent in second quarter of 2013. Worms, Trojans and viruses were most prevalent form of attack in India.

The US topped the encounter rate followed by Brazil, Russia and Turkey. Other countries are Mexico, Germany, France, China and the UK. Encounter rate refers to a percentage of computers running Microsoft real-time security products encountering malware during particular period.