How do spammers send out millions of messages at a time? One tool is a program called Send-Safe, which is marketed and sold by a company in Russia. Some have speculated, in fact, that the program’s makers are directly or indirectly related to the authors of the Mydoom, Bagle, and Sobig viruses.
Today, F-Secure reports that the company’s flagship Web site has been shut down. The details are interesting reading:
There are some interesting developments going on with the Send-Safe spamming tool. Together with tools like “Mailerboy” and “Darkmailer”, Send-Safe is one of the most popular tools used by spammers to send spam. Send-Safe even includes a built-in support for sending the spam via home machines infected with viruses like Mydoom, Bagle and Sobig.Whois info of send-safe.com
Various antispam organizations and authorities have tried to fight the company behind Send-Safe with little results. The company is run by Mr. Ruslan Ibragimov, operating just outside downtown Moscow.
Especially our friends at Spamhaus have aggressively tried getting the website http://www.send-safe.com shut down. Suprisingly, the site has apparently been hosted by MCI Worldcom – one of the largest service providers in the world.
But now something is finally happening, as the website has disappeared.
The screen shots provide a fascinating window into how this stuff works. If you’re a computer security wonk, the F-Secure News from the Lab blog should be in your list of must-read RSS feeds.
Ed Bott 