Originally published March 8 2005
Text messaging spam doubles, even as email spam filters grow more effective
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
With email filtering systems becoming more effective, spammers are now turning to mobile text messages to get their messages out. This has effectively doubled the number of spam messages from 18% of traffic to 43%. Unfortunately, spam blockers for text messaging software are not as effective as email filters. Even worse, cell phone customers have to pay for the spam text messages they receive.
- Spam accounts for close to half of all text messages sent to cell phones, a percentage that has more than doubled in just one year, said a text messaging provider Monday.
- According to Wireless Services, which claims to manage 15 to 20 percent of all text message traffic for U.S. wireless carriers, 43 percent of all text is now spam.
- A year ago, said Wireless Services, that rate was just 18 percent.
- In December 2004 alone, added the Bellevue, Wash.-based firm, 1.2 million spam text messages were blocked by the company.
- Wireless Services attributes the surge to smarter and more sophisticated spammers who are moving beyond the traditional venue of e-mail.
- "While they initially sent messages to mobile phones via the Internet, they are now savvy enough about wireless networks to foil anti-spam technologies developed with e-mail in mind," said Rich Begert, the chief executive of Wireless Services, in a statement.
- The economics of cell phones -- and thus the spam they receive -- is quite different from e-mail, Begert noted.
- "With mobile spam, consumers have to pay for the delivery of annoying, unwanted messages to their personal phone," he said as he made a pitch for his company's services.
- "Unless carriers get in front of the issue, they could see increased churn, unwanted legislation, and certainly, a rise in customer service calls," Begert said.
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