Spam e-mail

E-mail has become one of the most popular Internet services for instant and convenient message delivery. The classic definition of spam is unsolicited bulk messages, that is, messages sent to multiple recipients who did not ask for them. The problems caused by spam are due to the combination of the unsolicited and bulk aspects; the quantity of unwanted messages swamps messaging systems and drowns out the messages that recipients do want.

The impact of spam on the Internet community is great, causing significant financial costs and losses in productivity. Spam creates problems such as cost shifting, fraud, resource wastage, and the displacement of legitimate mail. The proliferation of spam is also a potential threat to the credibility of e-mail as a reliable and efficient means of communication over the Internet.

The original impetus for spam was advertising. A famous early usenet spam was from a lawyer advertising immigration service (“green card lottery”) and early e-mail spams advertised computer equipment, purported blueprints for atomic bombs, and magazine subscriptions. Since spam is so cheap, and is often anonymous, it is also popular for marginally or completely illegal schemes including fake drugs, pump and dump stock touts, money mule recruiting, and advance fee fraud.

Spam can merely carry annoying but benign advertising; however, it can also be the initial contact for cybercriminals, such as the operators of a fraudulent scheme who use emails to solicit prospective victims for money or to commit identity theft by deceiving recipients into sharing personal and financial account information.
Spam e-mail