Spam is a vector for cybercrime and commonly legally prohibited. Why do certain national jurisdictions produce a higher percentage of spam than others despite its prohibition? Why do some countries have a higher percentage of systems acting as spambots compared to other countries? We begin to answer there questions by conducting a cross-country empirical analysis of economic factors that correlate with the prevalence of spam and associated botnets. The economic factors under consideration are grounded in traditional theories of crime offline, as well as prior research in security economics. We found that more than 50% of spam can be attributed to having originated from merely seven countries, indicating that deterrence through policy is both feasible and economically rational. As expected, higher Internet adoption is correlated with higher percentage of spam from a country. Counterintuitively, Internet adoption is also positively correlated with the percentage of infected machines.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
customersupport@researchsolutions.com
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.