For a long time, speaking of “botnet junk” primarily meant speaking about endangered Windows systems. Yet, in the previous couple of years this premise is not any longer completely accurate. As we discussed in an earlier post, Junk through compromised passwords section of the quantity is a result of password maltreatment. Here we discuss the 2nd large mechanics: Abuse of vulnerable webservers.

The present scenario is caused by vast amounts of webservers running up old and exposed web applications; programs which are manipulated and used to install violent software including – but not restricted to – spamware. Since these machines are often servers hosted in datacenters instead of end user machines sitting behind ADSL connections that are slow, the quantity of junk they are able to pump outside is higher. That higher bandwidth readily explains why comparatively few junk sources can contribute so greatly to the international quantity of junk.