spam sent to iamjustsendingthisleter@domain.tld

[xavierg2]

I got a lot of similar spams.


As I have a catch all, I get all those.

What is very strange is the content of it:

Hi iamjustsendingthisleter.
How are you ? Call me.
daughter involved

What is the aim of such spam?

Xavier

[SysKoll]

Xavier,

Are you positive that there is no other content in the spam? What client did you use to inspect the message?

Spam with no visible content is generally used to spread viruses or to build a list of valid email address. Your spam sample also shows up in BBSes and blogs, maybe it's a failed attempt to spamvertize a site.

[xavierg2]

I use Outlook with AVG .

I had a look at the source of the message and didn't see anuthing suspicious

Many thanks for your answer

Xavier

[SysKoll]

I use Outlook with AVG .

I had a look at the source of the message and didn't see anuthing suspicious
Xavier

What you see in a spam message in Outlook depends entirely in the rootkits that have been installed on your system by this spam message. Example from http://www.slipstick.com/problems/virusmis.htm:

It's now been proven that malicious code can enter your system via an Outlook mail message from the Internet -- even if you do not open or preview it. The flaw is in an Internet Explorer component that Outlook shares with Outlook Express. See Microsoft Security Bulletin (MS00-043) for more details and remedies.

Unfortunately, there are many more zero-day, unpatched exploits targetting Outlook, and most of them are propagated through apparently empty spam. It got so bad that Outlook was banned from several campuses.

Bottom line, your machine can be infected with any kind of rootkit, and you cannot trust what it reports anymore, because you don't know if the system libraries are not corrupted.

I don't recommand using Outlook for anything but virus research. If your employer forces you to use an MS Exchange server, use the web interface of this server, which works under Firefox. This considerably reduces the risks.

[Paranoid2000]

I've received multiple copies of exactly the same message as have many others - just text with no links or images.

While it could be an attempt to winkle out spam reporters and spamtraps, I suspect it's more likely a retarded idiot trying to show what a big botnet he has.

[SysKoll]

I've received multiple copies of exactly the same message as have many others - just text with no links or images.

While it could be an attempt to winkle out spam reporters and spamtraps, I suspect it's more likely a retarded idiot trying to show what a big botnet he has.

Actually, it's spam text to poison Bayesian filters. It's the obvious response to Bayesian spam filters: pollute their little minds with regular text so that they start either letting spam go through or start giving false positives (in which case you have to turn them off).