Spam Putting up a Fight
If you have ever received spam informing you about a possible increase in a stock’s share price you have been targeted by a “Pump and Dump” spamming campaign. The latest effort (see above) was the text in an attached PDF document to unsuspecting recipients.
Opening the attachment isn’t harmful to your PC however if you were unfortunate enough to invest your hard earned cash into the stock you may find yourself with a worthless investment.
Australian IT has an article about this particular case:
The email cites a company press release announcing the opening of shops by Prime Time Stores in Puerto Rico and goes on to say: “Imagine if you had the chance to buy a Wal-Mart franchise in Mexico right when it first opened its doors there and all you needed was a small stake to get in.”
It adds: “Hurry, we see this stock starting to make the turn NOW. Big watch in effect for August 8, 2007!”.
The stock rose 2.35 per cent in morning trade in the United States on Wednesday to 0.087 dollars, but gained 30 per cent on Monday and 14.8 per cent on Tuesday in the days running up to the detection of the campaign.
“It turns out that it’s one of the kinds of spam that actually works,” said John Levine, chair of US-based Anti-Spam Research Group.
“There are at least two academic studies that show that the share does go up and the bad guys make money.”
Sophos estimates that “pump-and-dump” stock campaigns account for about 25 per cent of all spam nowadays, up from less than 1 per cent in January 2005.
Sophos’ Mr Cluley said the share-ramping scams target small stocks, often worth a fraction of a cent, which require only a small increase to deliver big gains.
“They send out fake news about a tiny stock and there are so many day-traders out there that are ready to jump on the bandwagon,” he said.
Posted by Jonathon Lanzon