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Botnets capable of 25,000 junk mail an hour

Up to 25,000 junk mail messages per hour can be dished out by a select group of botnets, leaving consumers inundated with unwanted spam messages, some of which can lead to data theft, it has emerged.

Internet security researchers have discovered that infected machines within the Rustock and Mega-D botnets are capable of sending out these kinds of volumes, with the former leading the pack with 26 per cent of the market share.

According to Marshal8e6 Tracelabs,"botnets morph, become obsolete, replaced, taken down and upgraded" but a tiny number of them are responsible for the bulk of all spam targeting internet users.

"We have developed algorithms and processes which track spam according to the botnet it was sent from," the company said of its research, which gave Mega-D a 21.6 per cent share of the junk mail market.

Others include the Pushdo botnet with 17.5 per cent and Xarvester with 8.2 per cent followed by, in descending order, Grum, Donbot and Gheg.

The BBC's Click programme recently highlighted how easy it was for cyber criminals to cause havoc with bots by buying one and using it in a mock attack.

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