Survey of UK Economy Reveals Tiered Sector Hierarchy Regarding Spam and Virus Problems
Spam and viruses are issues that are affecting different sectors of the UK economy in radically different orders of magnitude, according to the latest figures released by email management specialist Email Systems, with some sectors being hit considerably worse than others by spam and virus attacks and a clear “sector hierarchy’ emerging.
Along with the IT industry, which is understandably one of those worst hit, the Leisure and Entertainment sector, which includes sport, received almost one in ten of all spam mails sent over the last twelve months, whilst the manufacturing sector received more than one in three. Between them, these three sectors attracted more than 60% of all spam and virus mails since November 2004.
However, what also emerged from the research’s findings was that a second tier of sectors also exists, for which the problem is still extremely significant as each sector attracted hundreds of millions of spam and virus emails each year.
Roughly twenty-five percent of the spam and viruses received over the last twelve months have been split between the Construction Sector (1.13%), the Consumer Goods (including tobacco, alcohol and household goods) sector (5.8%), Financial Services and Banking (2.31%), the Public Sector (inc. Government/Education) (5.13%), Retail (5.15%), Support Services (ie Cleaning services) 3.14% and Tourism (2.82%).
With one in ten spam and virus mails targeting businesses in unidentifiable sectors, the remaining approximate 5% was divided between Agriculture (0.01%), Energy Utilities (i.e. Oil/Gas/Chemicals) (0.01%), Media & Marketing (1.23%), Motoring (inc. Transport) (0.49%) and Telecommunications 0.55%.
Neil Hammerton, CEO of Email Systems, commented:
“I suspect that many will find the most surprising aspect of these results to be that a large proportion of the worst affected sectors are traditional industries, whilst sectors such as media and marketing and telecommunications are apparently amongst those least affected.
“One possible explanation is that many of the traditional sector corporate organisations are extremely large businesses that may be spread across many countries. Consequently these organisations may represent a more attractive target for spammers looking to generate revenue through Denial of Service attacks or indeed just better awareness of their target via Dictionary Attacks – both of which entail enormous quantities of spam and are potentially crippling for businesses ill-equipped to deal with such a massive influx of email.”
Email Systems manages and monitors the flow of spam and virus infected email messages on behalf of millions of corporate and public sector users across the UK. For more information, visit www.EmailSystems.com or call 0870 141 7070.
About Email Systems:
Email Systems offers a comprehensive range of best-of-breed email management and protection services that are available either individually or as a modular package for Enterprise, ISP and OEM customers. These include archiving, image scanning and encryption, in addition to core anti-spam and anti-virus services. Email Systems’ web-based solutions ensure that clients need not download or manage software on their PC or server, offering complete peace of mind with no effort required. Email Systems is continually developing technical partnerships with global market leaders, such as Commtouch, which offers unique Recurrent Pattern Detection (RPD) technology to analyse large volumes of Internet traffic in real time, protecting customers from the first seconds of a spam or virus outbreak. Email Systems has offices in the United Kingdom, France and Sweden.