back to article Spam levels plummet as Rustock botnet taken down... for now

Spam volumes shrank on Wednesday after the prolific Rustock botnet fell silent, reportedly as a result of a takedown action. Rustock, which is made up of a network of compromised (malware-infected) Windows PCs, turns an illicit income for its unknown controllers by being the biggest single source of global spam. The botnet is …

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  1. Garve Scott-Lodge
    Thumb Up

    "simply too lucrative to disappear"

    Maybe not. Surely the pool of internet users who are dumb enough to follow links in spam emails is shrinking? When the day comes that I need some illicit Viagra I'm confident that a quick Google search will sort me out.

    Here's hoping that they've given up because it just wasn't making any money.

    1. Tigra 07

      RE: Garve

      It only takes 1 person to buy from a million emails for these crooks to turn a profit.

      After all, email is free so it's free advertising the more emails they send.

      1. Garve Scott-Lodge

        Not free

        I agree that it has been a very cost effective form of advertising in the past, but it's not free. Setting up and maintaining a botnet is likely to take a lot of man hours. You have to assume that there are people out there trying to catch you, so regularly have to shuffle your systems around to cover your tracks, At a guess one success in a million isn't enough to cover this - maybe it's one in ten thousand or less. And remember, nowadays with anti-spam improvements maybe less than 5% of the spam ever gets to the point where there's a chance that someone 'might' click on a link.

        I can see how well crafted phishing attacks might make money, but I'm still hoping that perhaps broadcast spam just isn't worth it any more.

      2. lglethal Silver badge
        Go

        To quote Einstein...

        “Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe.”

  2. Chris T Almighty

    They call this good news?

    How am I supposed to "Thrill her every night!" now?

    1. Ammaross Danan
      Coat

      Your quote is wrong....

      Usually the spam says something like: "Trill her nite every!"

      1. John Angelico
        Joke

        Indeed...

        ...but my voice isn't any good for trilling - and don't call me every!

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Maybe they feel they're more than rich enough

    Maybe - they felt it was time to retire to the south of France?

    You can't be declared a winner if the game continues. Once you have $50M in your account, leave.

  4. Thought About IT

    Renocide?

    Could this be a side effect of Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal tool taking out Win32/Renocide?

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/03/16/renocide_meets_msrt/

    Whatever, I've noticed a significant reduction in spam through my mail server, so I hope it's permanent.

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