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I love statistics. I love looking at a bunch of numbers and statistics and trying to figure the reasoning behind their fluctuations. Which brings me to the following statistic, unearthed by the folks at Shadowserver: on Christmas Day, Shadowserver recorded a sudden 20 percent drop in the number of bot-nets (from 500,000 to 400,000) they had been tracking.

At first this puzzled researchers, as they had no knowledge of any new bot-killer on the loose able to destroy large numbers of spam droids. Also, it certainly couldn’t be entirely explained by everyone taking their vacations over the holidays, as bot-nets are about the only things that don’t ever seem to take a break or need a vacation.

The explanation for the sudden drop is actually quite simple. The fact that many people got new computers for Christmas meant they shut-down their old machines, thereby shutting down the bot-net attached to their computer. But in no way will this provide any lasting relief from bot-nets. It is only a matter of time before the new ones become infected.

Posted by pschooff in Spam |Digg This|Add to del.icio.us

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