[February 08, 2005] Spammers Spread the Love on Valentine's Day; Clearswift Warns That Malware-Laden E-Cards, Valentine's Spam and X-Rated E-Mail Banter on the Menu Tweet REDWOOD CITY, Calif. --(Business Wire)-- Feb. 8, 2005 -- Cyber seducers take heed: the days running up to and including Feb. 14 have been highlighted as a time during which employees are at a greater risk of getting into hot water over their e-mail usage. Following a high-profile legal case at the beginning of this month involving a designer who was fired for sending explicit e-mails to her lover at work, Clearswift advises workers to not fall for the e-mail and Web security pitfalls that are prevalent around Valentine's Day. Feb. 14 may be the time for lonely hearts to confess their love, or for doting couples to send declarations of desire, but for businesses it has also become associated with something much less attractive: dredging up e-mail security issues. More X-rated e-mails are sent now than at any time of the year. Because amorous e-mail advances can easily spiral out of control, the risk of damage to a company's reputation is substantially increased. Moreover, secret admirers are not the only people looking to take advantage: spam selling flowers, chocolates and other gifts, as well as e-mails providing links to spoof Web sites, are particularly common at this time of year. Spammers and malware writers also use Feb. 14 to con unsuspecting end users into opening e-mail attachments and clicking on hypertext links -- all of which could turn a "harmless" online shopping experience into a nasty Valentine's virus. The situation is made worse by the tendency for individuals to forward large numbers of e-cards, screen savers and jokes on Valentine's Day. Organizations should use the week leading up to the event as a chance to remind employees of their official e-mail and spam policies at a time when the breaching of these policies becomes more likely. "Public holidays and events such as Valentine's Day are often used as dates for spammers to target their victims as they are likely to be more receptive to unsolicited e-mails," said Pete Simpson, ThreatLab manager at Clearswift. Socially engineered "Valentine spam," designed to take advantage of unsuspecting lonely hearts, could waste time and disrupt IT infrastructure. "It is particularly prevalent during the days running up to Feb. 14," he commented. "Affectionate e-mails, purporting to be from a potential lover, have proven to be effective in tricking people to break security procedures -- taking advantage of the natural helpfulness of people as well as their weaknesses." In addition to draining productivity, spam compromises network performance and has even been known to contain malicious code capable of corrupting files and disabling computers. Furthermore, the potential cost of just one pornographic spam e-mail finding its way to a sensitive employee or being forwarded from within an organization to a customer or partner can be staggering. Litigation cases involving sexual harassment charges can reach six- or even seven-figure sums. Clearswift is advising organizations to educate their employees on these security threats, implement e-mail- and Web-acceptable usage policies and enforce these policies with content security software that ensures inappropriate content does not enter, leave or move around the company network. About Clearswift Clearswift secures content and protects against digital attacks by enforcing security policies that increase productivity, reduce IT costs and create a safer business environment. Its world-leading business is founded on providing Total Content Security for e-mail and Web. The Internet is an invaluable business tool, but with it comes a harrowing collection of threats. Protecting against the circulation of inappropriate images and text, spam, breaches of confidentiality and viruses is now mission critical. Clearswift enables organizations to protect themselves against digital attacks, meet legal and regulatory requirements, implement productivity-saving policies and manage intellectual property passing through their network. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]