It only works because you click it

July 16, 2009 2:36 PM

Ars Technica reports 12% of e-mail users have actually tried to buy stuff from spam, according to a study by the Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group. Read the published survey here: part 1 (PDF), part 2(4.6MB zip file) and press release. (via).
posted by slogger (44 comments total)

We need to create some clever once in a lifetime chance to be strangled in your sleep with the mouse cord for the low low price of all life your savings...
posted by twine42 at 2:40 PM on July 16, 2009

I find that number surprisingly low... Probably because I expect all people over 40 to be as inept with "the internets" as my parents.
posted by selenized at 2:44 PM on July 16, 2009

12% of e-mail users need to lose their reproductive rights.
posted by autodidact at 2:45 PM on July 16, 2009 [5 favorites]

Fun fact: The Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group now has the most valuable list of emails in the world.
posted by saysthis at 2:50 PM on July 16, 2009 [8 favorites]

I know who these people are... my clients. Every week I hear about some great new SEO thing they want to try on their website. I try to point out that if they were indeed such masters of SEO, they wouldn't need to resort to an illegal marketing tactic for a new business plan but it just doesn't compute. At least I am only hearing about the SEO scams. I shudder for what horrors their spouses must face.

Didn't we have a thread once on an article about people who admitted they had fallen for the Nigerian prince scams?
posted by madamjujujive at 2:54 PM on July 16, 2009

I consider any email a site sends me because they automatically opted me into their mailing lists when I had some interaction with them spam.

they don't like it when they're called spammers but if they didn't ask and didn't give me an option of signing out while registering they're spammers to me. some might consider theirs normal and acceptable behavior on the web but it's really an american thing. european companies often uncheck their news, update and weekly offer options and they don't automatically share your info. privacy laws might have something to do with it.

anyway, by my own standard I've done business with spammers. damn you, irresistibly good deals on shoes.
posted by krautland at 2:59 PM on July 16, 2009

"I find that number surprisingly low... Probably because I expect all people over 40 to be as inept with "the internets" as my parents."

How ironic, I consider anyone under the age of 30 to be more interested in tweeting, facebooking, and myspaceing, than living a real life.

At least back in our day only smart people were online... the pendulum has swung significantly..

now...get off my lawn!
posted by HuronBob at 3:02 PM on July 16, 2009 [23 favorites]

>Didn't we have a thread once on an article about people who admitted they had fallen for the Nigerian prince scams?

I once saw a documentary about people who had been taken by various scams and still believed the scammers. Every person interviewed was still, often after being taken for tens of thousands of dollars, convinced that there really were millions out there, and that if only their spouse, the police, the government, whoever hadn't mucked things up they'd be millionaires.

There's got to be a medical term for that sort of nearly psychotic belief in free money, right?
posted by sotonohito at 3:05 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

I remember reading about one guy in the US who spammed to sell some legitimate software. The tactic was illegal, but the product was not. But it seems he's not in the Spamhaus top 10.

Fun fact: currently the US has almost 3 times the "known spam issues" as the next highest country, China.
posted by filthy light thief at 3:11 PM on July 16, 2009

I know someone who bought pink sheet stock based on a 'hot tip' spam email.

I'm embarrassed just typing that but it's true.

Postscript: it turned out to not be such a hot tip after all.
posted by mazola at 3:24 PM on July 16, 2009

An acquaintance of mine was constantly falling for these things, which probably had something to do with his Parkinson's medication. Strangely enough, some medications increase the risk of compulsive gambling as well as compulsive buying, both of which he had in abundance.
posted by neewom at 3:29 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

This will end well.

This will wendell.

This will givewell.

This will Timothy Treadwell.
posted by Elmore at 3:33 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

So Big Pharma, in league with the gambling industry, with intervention from The Saucer People...
posted by i_cola at 3:33 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

The best spam email subject line I ever received was: We are too lazy to think up a new subject line every week: please buy our viagra.
posted by Elmore at 3:36 PM on July 16, 2009 [4 favorites]

I have to admit I've been tempted to get a graduate degree from a prestigious non-accredited university (without reading boring books! based on things you already know!).
posted by mazola at 3:41 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

The best spam email subject line I ever received was: "Knock down walls with your johnson."

I did think for a second "That would be a cool superpower."
posted by marxchivist at 3:50 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

I find that number surprisingly low... Probably because I expect all people over 40 to be as inept with "the internets" as my parents.
...
How ironic, I consider anyone under the age of 30 to be more interested in tweeting, facebooking, and myspaceing, than living a real life.

You're both right! Everyone not between the ages of 30 and 40 are a bunch of yahoos.
posted by Justinian at 3:52 PM on July 16, 2009 [3 favorites]

I once saw a documentary about people who had been taken by various scams and still believed the scammers. Every person interviewed was still, often after being taken for tens of thousands of dollars, convinced that there really were millions out there, and that if only their spouse, the police, the government, whoever hadn't mucked things up they'd be millionaires.

Was it called Mad Money on CNBC?
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:54 PM on July 16, 2009 [19 favorites]

12% seems remarkably low to me too, but not because 12% of people are idiots. If you have ever, at any time throughout all of history, clicked on a link in a piece of spam, you are part of that 12%. That means that an incredible 88% of people have never clicked on a single one of the dozens of spams they get per day.
posted by DU at 4:16 PM on July 16, 2009

An acquaintance of mine was constantly falling for these things, which probably had something to do with his Parkinson's medication.

Note to self: Initiate spam campaign touting cheap Parkinson's meds.
posted by The Bellman at 4:23 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

Hopefully the practice is self-limiting. People who click on spam links must surely be massively more prone to virus and trojan infection than the mean, so hopefully they're tending to take themselves offline pretty rapidly.

The down side is of course that for the remaining time they continue to run at all, their machines are soldiers in various spambot armies, and when they finally grind to a halt, Microsoft's bottom line improves as they buy new PCs to replace their hyperinfected mudsucking no-run-worth-shit-anymore machines.
posted by George_Spiggott at 4:39 PM on July 16, 2009

12% seems remarkably low to me too, but not because 12% of people are idiots. If you have ever, at any time throughout all of history, clicked on a link in a piece of spam, you are part of that 12%. That means that an incredible 88% of people have never clicked on a single one of the dozens of spams they get per day.

I'm taking that as an admission.
posted by Chuckles at 4:42 PM on July 16, 2009

I don't even know if I'm in the 12%. I've been using email for like 15 years. No way do I remember if I've EVER clicked on EVEN ONE spam. The odds are against it (88 to 12). Although maybe those 12 are the ones who've had the longest to slip up, which raises my chances.
posted by DU at 4:46 PM on July 16, 2009

How ironic, I consider anyone under the age of 30 to be more interested in tweeting, facebooking, and myspaceing, than living a real life.

Most twitter users are in their 30s and 40s. Twitter is not a "kids" thing at all, probably because so easy to use for people who aren't really all that computer literate.
posted by delmoi at 5:14 PM on July 16, 2009

12% seems remarkably low to me too, but not because 12% of people are idiots. If you have ever, at any time throughout all of history, clicked on a link in a piece of spam, you are part of that 12%.

What are you talking about? It's not "have you ever clicked a link in spam" the question is "have you ever try to buy something from a spam message."

Only people who:
1) Remember trying to buy something, not just clicking the link
2) Are willing to admit it.

Will be included in the results. Everyone claiming they'd be in the 88% would be, by the very fact they are claiming to be in it (assuming they would say the same thing to us as they would to the people doing the survey)
posted by delmoi at 5:16 PM on July 16, 2009

Most twitter users are in their 30s and 40s.

Source? Most of the articles I can find about this rely on quantcast data, which is ambiguous about that/

http://www.quantcast.com/twitter.com (51% are under 34... they dont have a cutoff at 30)

So probably a slight majority are 30+.

I'd be curious to see a ranking of tweet frequency by age though, and what the breakdown of personal vs business use is by age group (anecdotally, most of the people in their 30's I know who use Twitter use it primarily as a business networking/communication/advertising tool and not a social one).
posted by wildcrdj at 5:42 PM on July 16, 2009

I find that number surprisingly low... Probably because I expect all people over 40 to be as inept with "the internets" as my parents.

Sad but true. In my over 70 bracket people think I am a gee whiz computer guru. Me who spent two weeks partitioning, installing, uninstalling and finally properly installing linux. It is amazing how terrified people are of the whole "internets" thing. And nothing I have discovered will enable them. Believe me. I have tried.
posted by notreally at 5:45 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

12%? No way people are that dumb.

*shrugs, remembers some guy P.T. something or other.....
posted by caddis at 6:15 PM on July 16, 2009

I now know the percentage of population with uncomfortably small, pre-ejaculating dicks.
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 6:27 PM on July 16, 2009

"Knock down walls with your johnson."

I'm working on a big Samuel Johnson project right now, and I'm envisioning him bursting through like the Kool-Aid man.

I now know the percentage of population with uncomfortably small, pre-ejaculating dicks.

No, it's still too low, because I've never bought... Oh, shit. Um, look over there! [flees]
posted by Horace Rumpole at 7:24 PM on July 16, 2009

I recently got a spam with the subject: "Does your bedroom not smell like intimacy anymore? Fix it!"

Just thought I'd share.
posted by brundlefly at 8:01 PM on July 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

> Didn't we have a thread once on an article about people who admitted they had fallen for the Nigerian prince scams?

Just last year I had a patron (male, probably about 40) at the library who approached me at the reference desk and told me that he had just received an email from a bank representative who...etc., etc., etc. It was a scam, I told him. Under no circumstances should you email this person back, I told him. "Are you sure?" he asked. It all sounded so official, and he didn't want to miss out on what could be a valuable opportunity! "Mister," I said, "I GUARANTEE you it's a scam." He asked me how I could be so sure, so I Googled him through a few news stories about people being taken for large sums of cash in similar schemes. This seemed to convince him, but boy oh boy did he ever look crestfallen as he left the room. He really thought he was on the verge of something big.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:42 PM on July 16, 2009

>"Knock down walls with your johnson."

Damn...and here I was thinking the email I got promising me the ability to hammer nails with my dick was a big deal.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:43 PM on July 16, 2009

MetaFilter: it only works because you click it.

(well, someone had to do it)
posted by askmehow at 10:14 PM on July 16, 2009

I've said it before, but it bears repeating: The dumbest 1% of the US population is still three. million. people.




Now if I could get each of them to hand me a single dollar...
posted by Wild_Eep at 11:18 PM on July 16, 2009

most of the people in their 30's I know who use Twitter use it primarily as a business networking/communication/advertising tool

I've always been curious about this. Do people really sign up to twitter to allow themselves to receive a new channel of spam?

No sooner had I signed up than I got all these followers, who wanted nothing more than to spam me with urls. I suppose if you were really incompetent and couldn't figure out how to block people, you could end up with a load of these.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 12:03 AM on July 17, 2009

Someone once told me of a sort-of scam (only sort-of because nothing was promised) where one advertises that "Now is your last chance to send your dollar bills (specify a common year/series) to PO BOX blah blah! Last chance, this chance won't be repeated!" and then sits back to collect envelopes of dollar bills.

3 million in the bottom 1% you say? Hmmm...
posted by Goofyy at 2:11 AM on July 17, 2009

Well, I guess "business networking" is sort of like peer-to-peer spam, yes.
posted by nebulawindphone at 4:10 AM on July 17, 2009

12% of e-mail users need to lose their reproductive rights

What, with a giant, throbbing mantruncheon that will keep her gasping for more night after night?

You try and stop them.
posted by MuffinMan at 5:03 AM on July 17, 2009 [1 favorite]

probably because [Twitter is] so easy to use for people who aren't really all that computer literate.
posted by fourcheesemac at 5:57 AM on July 17, 2009

@autodidact:
I'd bet that most of that 12% is too young to reproduce now anyway.
posted by vim876 at 6:13 AM on July 17, 2009

It doesn't seem wildly implausible to me. Spam isn't all about viagra and fake degrees; I don't get much spam (maybe five a week, between three email addresses) but most of it seems to be advertising real products.

One of my email addresses kept getting spam promoting holiday packages to a chain of hotels that actually seems to exist. Looking at the underlying HTML, the links seemed to be affiliate links to the real website. Presumably the spammer gets some commission if I book a hotel room, just like Metafilter gets comission if I go to Amazon through one of MeFi's affiliate links.

My work email account keeps getting spam that's actually targeted to my field, promoting new startups and products that could conceivably be useful to someone in my industry. At least some of the companies and products are often ones I recognise as real and the links mostly look like affiliate account links to the legit websites. I can easily believe that people buy stuff from spam like this.

....

That rather sucked the fun out of the discussion, so here's the best spam email subject line I ever received:
"ShAtTeR hEr MeAt TuNnEl WiTh YoUr IRON SCHLONG!!!"

That was the first time I'd ever encountered the word schlong. I laughed so hard I nearly fell off my chair.
posted by metaBugs at 7:17 AM on July 17, 2009

Interestingly, a larger percentage of people who were interviewed by phone said that they had never acted on a spam message compared to those who answered online. Guess it's true that users would rather not admit their foibles when speaking to a real person.

Or maybe spammers stuffed the on-line survey to make spam seem like a more viable and respectable marketing technique.
posted by Western Infidels at 7:24 AM on July 17, 2009

One of my favorite spam stories involved a message I got via ICQ shortly after it came out. A random person hit me with the "We have the best hot chicks!" with a link to some site. (This is before bots were really a viable tool for this kind of thing, so I was reasonably certain that the person sending it was, in fact, a person.) and unlike most hit-and-runs the account stayed online after sending the message. Because I could, I pulled their IP address and checked the TOS/ AUP of the ISP it was attached to, and a couple of minutes later I responded with something to the effect of: "Hey, you just sent me some spam. I just wanted to let you know that according to this link [link] you are in violation of your ISPs terms of service. Plus, it's a really unpleasant thing that you are doing; It makes people unhappy."

I didn't expect a response so I was shocked as hell when a couple of minutes later "Sorry." popped up, and they quickly went offline.

The version of ICQ I was running kept a log of everyone you had ever corresponded with and a couple of weeks later, I noticed that the spammer account was back online. I wrote them, "So, you still trying to make money using this account?"

They didn't respond. But the account went offline and I never saw it active again.
posted by quin at 9:04 AM on July 17, 2009