After labouring under the dubious distinction of being one of the world's major sources of spam, Canada has finally fallen off the list of the "Dirty Dozen" nations sending spam.
The new list, released Thursday by SophosLabs, a security company based in Lynnfield, Mass., shows that for the first quarter of this year, Canada had cut its spam output by more than half, accounting for only 1.25 per cent of the worldwide spam output. For the last quarter in 2005, Canada accounted for 3 per cent of the total output and ranked fifth on the list of offending countries.
The list counts those countries where computers send spam, not those countries where the spam originated. Much spam is relayed, via compromised computers in homes and businesses around the world, which have been remotely instructed to send the messages.
A spokeswoman for Sophos speculated that the disappearance of Canada from the list is the result of "the continued regulatory efforts as well as increased Internet safety vigilance by Canadian consumers."
The United States once again dominated the list, accounting for 23.1 per cent of the world's spam output, but the rate has fallen steadily and dramatically over the past two years. In late 2004, U.S. spam output ran at 42.5 per cent, and in late 2005 it had dropped to 24.5 per cent.
The reduction in US-relayed spam and the departure of Canada from the top-12 list threw much of the Dirty Dozen list into a new skew, showing China, at 21.9 per cent, now challenging the United States for the top.
Spam-relaying percentages from Poland, Spain and Germany rose between late 2005 and early 2006, while the Great Britain, which was absent altogether from the 2005 end-of-year list, has now re-entered in tenth place.
SophosLabs concluded that the United States, despite its continued regulatory efforts and reduction in spam, remains the top spam-relaying country. However, together China, Hong Kong, South Korea, Japan and Taiwan account for almost half of the worldwide spam output, making Asia the most offending continent.
When ranked by continent, North America and Europe vie for a close second.
The top 12 spam-relaying countries from January to March 2006 are:
1. United States (23.1 per cent)
2. China/Hong Kong (21.9 per cent)
3. S Korea (9.8 per cent)
4. France (4.3 per cent)
5. Poland (3.8 per cent)
6. Spain (3.3 per cent)
7. Germany (3 per cent)
8. Brazil (2.9 per cent)
9. Japan (2.0 per cent)
10. Great Britain (1.9 per cent)
11. Netherlands (1.8 per cent)
12. Taiwan (1.6 per cent)
Others (20.6 per cent)
"Although we're seeing a worldwide increase in zombies, hijacked PCs infected by malware, Americans have vigilantly increased protection on their computers from malicious hackers resulting in a significant decrease in spam coming from the United States," Sophos security analyst Ron O'Brien said in a statement.
He said that with legislation such as the CAN-SPAM Act and greater information sharing by Internet Service Providers, the United States has led the way in imposing severe penalties and fines for its most prolific spammers.
During the first quarter of 2006, several gang members responsible for distributing massive quantities of pornography admitted their involvement in a spam ring, and its members are now facing sentencing by the U.S. courts in the next few months.
Earlier this month, Australia successfully prosecuted its first spammer under Australia's Spam Act Laws.
