India is top spam sender in Asia, says study

New Delhi: India is the top spam sender in Asia and the seventh largest in the world, accounting for over four per cent of the total global spam, says a study.

"India is the leader among Asian countries in spam, accounting for more than four per cent of the total global spam and is ahead of other Asian countries such as China (3.39 per cent), Republic of Korea (2.57 per cent) and Thailand (2.04 per cent)," says Trend Micro, a firm that provides Internet content security, focusing on securing the exchange of digital information for businesses and consumers.

Globally, the Russian federation heads the list of spammers, accounting for more than 11 per cent of total spam, followed by the US at 9.36 per cent. The BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) together account for around 20 per cent of all spam.

"Asia contributes 16.57 per cent of the global spam volume. The world's top 10 spam relaying countries account for about 57.4 per cent of the global spam volumes," reveals the study that was released earlier this month.

Spam is the practice of sending unwanted e-mail messages, frequently with commercial content, in large quantities to an indiscriminate set of recipients.

"Since 2003, the volumes of spam have been growing steadily, now reaching in excess of 80 per cent of all Internet traffic," said Country Manager (India and SAARC) Trend Micro, Niraj Kaushik.

"Most spam today is to advertise 'get-rich-quick' schemes and similar dubious products. Starting off being a small irritant that most enterprises used to ignore, spam today has taken the shape of a huge calamity. Enterprises not having a policy to curb spam will eventually see their profitability and productivity being affected," Kaushik added.

Elaborating on how to effectively fight spam, he said: "The most effective solutions against spam combine a strong reputation system with a comprehensive filtering system that includes heuristics, statistical analysis, signature filters and multi-lingual detection."

He added: "The key lies in security solutions that keep user systems updated in real-time."

Experts at Trend Micro further indicated that spam from emerging markets would continue to grow until proper Internet infrastructure was in place.