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According to security vendor Symantec, a shift has taken place in the weight of the spam networks, the European ones having created more unsolicited e-mail than those in the US lately. Thus, approximately 44 per cent of all spam messages are originated from Europe as compared to 35.1 per cent originated from the US.

In the opinion of one of Symantec's European product marketing managers, Fredrik Sjostedt, the advantage taken by European spammers is due to the large penetration of broadband. "Historically the majority of spammers were U.S.-based, but now we're seeing a lot of Eastern European and Russian spam gangs active (.) We've moved away from traditional, individual spammers, to

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The European Commission has criticized the member countries, considering that they should better implement the present legal framework and fight against spam, but also take more seriously into consideration the spyware and malicious software issues.

According to the recent figures made public by Sophos, approx. 32% of the world's spam comes from European countries, with France, Spain, Poland and Italy on the top. And this situation occurs when all the EU countries have implemented the 2002 E-privacy Directive that has imposed the opt-in principle on spam. Cooperation in effectively implementing the legal acts is lacking in most of the European Countries.

The Commission presented two European best practices in the fight against

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The first global Internet Governance Forum (IGF) was organized by United Nations in Athens between 30 October and 2 November 2006.

The forum has shown a strong and large opposition to Internet blocking and filtering, putting under pressure repressive governments such as China. The three sessions devoted to content regulation and control have been dominated by the advocates of anti-censorship and access to knowledge that have criticized the state control of Internet content.

Thus, Amnesty International publicly handed a pledge, called Irrepressible Info. that states: "I believe the Internet should be a force for political freedom, not repression. People have the right to seek and

A new recommendation on the cross-border co-operation in the enforcement of laws against spam was adopted by the OECD Council session on 13 April 2006, completing the Anti-spam toolkit promoted by OECD since 2004.

The recommendation admits that there is not single solution for tackling the spam issues and the international cooperation is the key in solving the problem. The OECD document urges countries to ensure that their laws enable enforcement authorities to share information with other countries and promote the establishment of a single national contact point to facilitate international cooperation.

According to OECD recommendation there are four important areas that need to be taken into account by the member countries: establishing a domestic framework, improving the ability to cooperate, improving procedures for

A report from the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) on the spam issue considers that a more effective approach would be to require the establishment of enforceable codes of conduct by Internet service providers, but at the same time promoting anti-spam legislation in all the countries in the world.

ITU has recently published its 7th edition of Trends in Telecommunication Reform that examines the regulatory challenges and opportunities of enabling ICT development. The report provides regulators with tools they can use to promote effective and innovative development and use of ICTs in a competitive environment. The 7th chapter, publicly available on the ITU website, consists in a report prepared by John Palfrey, Executive Director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, regarding the present global

The European Commission has issued a press release announcing stronger collaboration between anti-spam enforcement authorities in Europe. "Anti-spam enforcement authorities in 13 European countries have agreed to share information and pursue complaints across borders in a pan-European drive to combat spam. They will co-operate in investigating complaints about cross-border spam from anywhere within the EU, so as to make it easier to identify and prosecute spammers anywhere in Europe."

There are still very few public hotlines in Europe where internet users can report spam. These hotlines usually only accept complaints about unsolicited e-mail originating in their own country. In that light, the promise of closer collaboration between European authorities seems a bit futile, if the final recipients of the mail, the Internet users, are not involved.

The US researcher Benjamin Edelman, famous for his publications about internet filtering in China and in Saudi Arabia, has turned to spyware, and the results of his research are impressive. In November 2004 he did a simple test, to find out how much junk can get installed on a user's PC visiting a single webpage. "In the course of my testing, my test PC was brought to a virtual stand-still -- with at least 16 distinct programs installed. I was not shown licenses or other installation prompts for any of these programs, and I certainly didn't consent to their installation on my PC. (...) Other symptoms of the infection included unwanted toolbars, new desktop icons (including sexually-explicit icons), replacement desktop wallpaper ("warning! you're in danger! all you do with computer is stored

The large US provider Verizon (3 million DSL customers and 1 million dial-up customers) is systematically blocking e-mail from Europe, as well as from China and New Zealand. On 22 December 2004 Verizon has installed new central spam-filters that refuse e-mail from many large European providers. Attempts from European ISPs to have their mail-servers white-listed have only been partially successful. Internet users that don't use the mail-servers from their ISP, because they run their own mail-servers, don't stand a chance at all to communicate with Verizon customers. Verizon media relations manager Ells Edwards told Wired that he didn't know when the ISP would lift its blockade. And true to the Verizon telephony roots he added: "If it's really important you might want to make a phone call."

For the first time since the spam-ban went into force in the Netherlands (19 May 2004) the Dutch regulatory authority OPTA has fined Dutch spammers. One spammer is accused of having sent 4 spam-runs and now faces a fine of 42.500 euro. Two of his spams advertised a CD-ROM with invoice-software, another one was directly aimed at discrediting the most famous spam-fighter in the Netherlands, Rejo Zenger. His organisation Spamvrij maintained an on-line blacklist of notorious Dutch spammers. The spammer tried to make it look as if Rejo Zenger had sent spam advertising the book Mein Kampf.

OPTA has also fined an SMS-spammer with 20.000 euro in total, for sending unsolicited SMS's costing the recipient 1,10 euro per message, without providing any unsubscribe options.

Currently, in the Netherlands only natural persons are protected against

Research by Forrester, commissioned by the Business Software Alliance, shows an incredibly high number of Europeans that use spam to buy computer software, clothes/jewellery and travel/leisure products. In France, Germany and the UK, 1 in every 5 internet users said they had bought one of these things via spam. The poll was simultaneously conducted in Brazil, Canada and the US, under 1.000 online respondents per country. Brazil tops the chart of purchases in every category.

Usually, a maximum response rate of 1 in every 10.000 spam mails is assumed, but the Forrester poll indicates at least 20% of all the spam mails is actually read. The Business Software Alliance assumes most of the spamvertised software is illegal, and offers 10 tips for consumers to detect 'software spam scams', including the tip to report piracy to the BSA.