Spam News

ISPs need better web filters

Friday, September 5, 2008

Internet service providers (ISPs) need to do more to protect clients from botnets and other security threats by improving antivirus protection and web filters, it has been claimed.

A recent report from Dark Reading warns that current protection methods often fail to identify spam email and phishing scams, leaving users vulnerable.

It urged ISPs to upgrade web filters to respond to the changing face of email threats.

The majority of spam emails now attempt to compromise systems using malicious website addresses rather than attachments, the website claimed.

As such, internet providers needed to update web filters to compensate for this.

"ISPs that aren't updating filtering techniques to catch these threats are inadvertently enabling botnet infections as well as spam proliferation," the article warned.

Meanwhile, recent research from Shadow Server has identified a four-fold rise in the number of botnets in operation during the summer period.

This in turn has led email security researchers to call for better tracking and management of the increasing threat.