Spammers give up on PDF - should you? [BT broadband office]

Spammers give up on PDF - should you?

Posted 13 September 2007 at 8:08AM by Simon Dickson in Email and communications

There's an ominous message for online marketing in the latest security research by UK specialists Sophos.

Earlier this summer, they noted an out-of-the-blue increase in spam email using PDF attachments to try and avoid detection: in one week at the start of August, nearly 30% of all detected spam messages had PDF files attached. But now, barely a month later, the proportion has dropped to 'virtually zero'.

'There can only be one reason: it's not working,' says Sophos expert Graham Cluley. 'Spammers wouldn't turn away from PDF spam if it was an effective way to fill their pockets with cash. Have you tried opening a PDF file? Adobe Acrobat chugs into action, taking a fair while to load before it can show you the contents of the PDF. Consumers pretty quickly learn that it's a waste of time to open every unsolicited PDF they receive.' And of course, he's right - even with the minimalist PDF tools we mentioned the other week, it's an extra delay we don't need.

PDF has long been a 'get out of jail' option for people who wouldn't or couldn't produce proper electronic communication. Designers were attracted to the flexibility of the file format: unlike HTML, you could guarantee exactly what the end user was going to see. But more often, it was a no-effort way to turn a paper product into an online product... even if it wasn't going to be a good online product.

Now here's some evidence suggesting that people simply don't like PDFs: or rather, they don't like them when they didn't ask for them. Sophos admit it's probably too early to draw any conclusions - but it's definitely food for thought, if PDF is part of your e-marketing plans.

Tags: pdf, sophos, spam

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Comments

1. At September 13, 2007 10:55 AM, anjanesh wrote:

PDF can be used to create online forms too (connected to a database or whatever);you can use PDF for presentations (lightweight and easily portable across platforms) and loads of interactive stuff with javascript within PDF.
Openoffice is one of the best platforms for creating PDF files (as well as office documents;HTML;XML;databases..)
As for spammers -they should be executed.Period.

2. At September 13, 2007 4:12 PM, mike wrote:

I agree with the comment from Anjanish above. We too use open office with a Linux OS. The pdf is a useful cross platform tool for us. I detest "Spam" and luckily don't receive much.

3. At September 14, 2007 4:57 AM, marcus wrote:

We use pdf as a standard in all attachments, for the sake of a few seconds load time we can guarantee the client will be able to see a proof of there work that will look as its meant to (colours, fonts, etc.).

Its not a 'get out of jail' option! what other formats can you send graphics, colours, images, designs, etc. and ensure the end user can see all of this in one document!

4. At September 14, 2007 1:32 PM, kim wrote:

we have to use pdf for our location map. clients dont always like it, especially our average home user that doesnt always have a pdf viewer installed on their pc - nor do they know what it is.
BUT as others have said there isnt really any alternative given some of the limitations of html.

5. At September 18, 2007 5:45 PM, Chris wrote:

pdf is perfect for sending unchangeable certified easily readable documents from whatever application you happen to be using. - AND you should NEVER NEVER NEVER open unsolicited documents anyway. In my company that is a termination offence !!!!!

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