Firm develops way to fight pictoral spam

May 17, 2006

Israeli e-mail security company Comtouch unveiled Tuesday new technology designed to target spam that consists only of pictures.

"During the past few months, we analyzed a large number of mail messages and identified a worrying rise in the use of spam that includes only pictures, and no text or links," Comtouch President and Chief Technology Officer Amir Lev said via the statement.

"Regular anti-spam solutions found on the market today (are) based on content analysis, identifying Internet addresses and different (types of) virus filters don't address picture spam and leave the user lacking a defense," Lev continued.

The picture spam identification technology uses a patented algorithm to find repeating patterns in an e-mail, not necessarily connected to language, the statement said. The company also said the new technology allows it to identify, crack and block picture spam just like it would protect against regular spam.

"We're very satisfied with the new protection system Comtouch designed," BlueCat Networks Chief Executive Officer Michael Hyatt said via the Comtouch statement. "The new spam-blocking abilities allow us to improve our (competitiveness)."

Comtouch said it analyzes more than 1.5 billion e-mail messages a month to develop its spam-blocking technologies.

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