Fighting malware and spam

The Spammers' Compendium

The Spammers' Compendium was started by John Graham-Cumming in January 2003 to keep track of the methods used by spammers. Notes of a talk about The Spammers' Compendium, given at the MIT Spam Conference in 2003, can be found here. Since 2008 The Spammers' Compendium has been hosted on the VB website.

Have you seen a new spamming technique that is being used in the wild, or have you seen an interesting example of an existing technique? Please let us know at tsc@virusbtn.com.

See also

• The Spammers' Compendium: five years on (Presentation during VB2007)
• SPUTR: a proposal for the uniform naming of spammer and phisher content tricks (requires free registration)

Entries

Entries are sorted chronologically, with the most recent entries at the top. They can also be sorted by name, purpose and technology. The names between parentheses are the SPUTR names.

• A small area (TA!Textarea!HTML)
• Ignore the smallprint (TA!Smallprint!HTML)
• Script in the middle (UO!Script in the Middle!JavaScript)
• The Responsibility Transfer (UO!Responsibility!JavaScript)
• Colored Matrix (BWO!ColorMatrix!HTML)
• Numbers by Painting (BWO!Painting!HTML)
• Where are you going? (UH!OpenRedirect!Plain)
• Pump up the volume (TA!Pump!Audio)
• Times Square (TA!Times!Image)
• Excel Sent (TA!Excel!Office)
• Are you feeling lucky, Sergey? (UH!Lucky!Plain)
• Pretty Darn Fancy (TA!Fancy!PDF)
• In the background (TA!Background!HTML)
• Doing The Twist (TA!Twist!Image)
• A Flash In The Pan (UO!PanFlash!Flash)
• The Sieve (TA!Sieve!Image)
• Strip Mining (TA!Strip!Image)
• Animated Noise (TA!Noise!Image)
• Phish Phorm (UO!Phorm!HTML)
• 1 across, 3 down (BWO!Crossword!HTML)
• Cross your fingers and click (UH!Mustaca!HTML)
• Whiter Shade of Pale (TA!Pale!HTML)
• Slick Click Trick (UH!Caption!HTML)
• Now you see it; now you don't (BWO!Copperfield!CSS)
• Big Header-ed (TA!BigHeader!Plain)
• The Rake (BWO!TheRake!CSS)
• Chop GUI (TA!ChopGUI!HTML)
• The Small Picture (TA!SmallPicture!HTML)
• Floatation Device (TA!Floatation!CSS)
• Sticky Fingers (BWO!StickyFingers!Plain)
• The Matrix (TA!Matrix!Plain)
• You cannot be serious (UO!McEnroe!HTML)
• Treasure Map (UH!TreasureMap!HTML)
• Catch a Wave (TA!Wave!HTML)
• About Face (BWO!AboutFace!HTML)
• Spell Breaker (BWO!Splenig!Plain)
• Absolute Zero (TA!AbsoluteZero!HTML)
• But, is it art? (BWO!ASCIIArt!Plain)
• Doing the Splits (BWO!Splits!Plain)
• The Office (TA!Office!Office)
• Blankety Blank (BWO!BlanketyBlank!HTML)
• Sound of Silence (WB!Silence!HTML)
• FlexHex (BWO!FlexHex!CSS)
• The tURLing test (UO!TurlingTest!Plain)
• WYSI_not_WYG (UH!WYSINotWYG!JavaScript)
• Internet Exploiter (UO!InternetExploiter!HTML)
• The Microdot (BWO!Microdot!CSS)
• Don't Cramp My Style (GWI!Style!CSS)
• Control Freak (TA!ControlFreak!Plain)
• You've been framed (BWO!Framed!HTML)
• Another Form of Desperation (GWI!Form!HTML)
• It's Mini Marquee! (GWI!Marquee!HTML)
• A Form of Desperation (BWO!Form!HTML)
• And in the right corner (HB!RightCorner!Plain)
• Camouflage (GWI!Camouflage!HTML)
• Honorary Title (GWI!Title!HTML)
• No Whitespace, No Cry (TA!NoWhitespace!Plain)
• Honey, I shrunk the font (GWI!ShrunkFont!HTML)
• Bogus Login (UO!BogusLogin!HTML)
• A Numbers Game (BWO!numbers!HTML)
• The Black Hole (BWO!BlackHole!HTML)
• Speaking in Tongues (HB!Tongues!Plain)
• Ze Foreign Accent (BWO!Accent!Plain)
• Script Writer (TA!Script!Javascript)
• Enigma (UO!Enigma!HTML)
• L O S T i n S P A C E (BWO!Space!Plain)
• MIME is Money (GWI!PlainNotHTML!MIME)
• Slice and Dice (TA!SliceNDice!HTML)
• Hypertextus Interruptus (BWO!Interruptus!HTML)
• The Daily News (GWI!BigTag!HTML)
• Invisible Ink (GWI!Invisible!HTML)
• The Big Picture (TA!BigPicture!HTML)