Here Is The City gets pretty well flooded with spam, as we publish some email links on the site, and it's always interesting to see the spammers in action as they attempt to beat the spam catchers while ensnaring potential victims. Which is why a report of Pfizer computers being used to send out millions (billions?) of spam messages caught our eye.

One spam trend that appeared this summer, broke records, and then disappeared almost as quickly, was that of PDF spam. The unwanted emails usually consisted of merely a PDF attachment, nothing more, nothing less. The PDF's contained fake reports touting the benefits of a particular junk stock.

The junk stock spam trick is relatively popular at the moment and is particularly suited to large scale spam attacks. The spammers will buy up bulk amounts of stock in low priced companies before barraging fake buy recommendations on to the public. Once the stock starts gaining value, inevitably as it seems that there are still people out their gullible enough to buy off the back of spam, then the spammers dump all of their stock making moderate gains over the volume before moving on to the next victim.

The PDF scam seemed relatively pointless to us as it required that extra step to open it up, at the time the spammers may well have been thinking it would add a weight of credibility to the email. Ultimately the emails were probably very easy to stop and this was reflected in their short 15 minutes of fame. At its peak, on the 7th August, PDF spam was accounting for 30 percent of all spam worldwide, one particular piece, touting stock in Prime Time Group, was sent out over a 1 week period and at the time was the largest spam in history. By the end of the month PDF spam had slumped back to less than 1 percent of total volume.

One company that may well have been hit hard by the PDF spam epidemic was Pfizer. According to Wired, the company, it appears, has been unwittingly sending spam from their network, 138 different IP addresses to be exact, over a 6 month period. A system that should have been sealed up was hacked and infiltrated by malware which then went in to overload, sending out advertising for the company's own little blue pills as well as fake Rolex watches, junk stocks and penis enlargement products.

How a company as large as Pfizer allowed and then failed to detect spam advertising their products being sent from 138 different corporate IP addresses over 6 months remains a question of conjecture!

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