Republican Candidate Leading the Spam Polls
As the US presidential election day draws nearer, the latest polls still show Hillary Clinton to be in the lead, with 46.6% of respondents stating their intention to vote for
the Democrat candidate compared to 41% stating a preference for Donald Trump, the Republican candidate. However, when it comes to spam emails, more specifically the subject lines
they employ to entice recipients to open them, the picture is quite different. During the months of June and July, Donald Trump’s name appeared a staggering 170 times more often
in spam mail subject lines than Hillary Clinton’s according to IT industry experts, a figure that would appear to suggest there is considerably more interest in the controversial
Republican candidate than there is in the Democrat candidate and wife of former president Bill Clinton.
Luring Recipients with Promises of Important News
The use of newsworthy subject lines in spam emails is not a new phenomenon: in an effort to get more people to actually open the emails they send,
the perpetrators of spam email campaigns have been creating email titles based on current affairs for many years.
The global appeal of US election news has merely made it a little easier for them to come up with enticing headlines this year and the fact that the majority of
them have been about Trump rather than Clinton probably says more about the shock tactics the Republican candidate has employed to
attract attention to himself rather than his popularity with voters.
Why You Should Be Careful
While those who are analysing the latest trends as far as spam email subject lines are concerned may be taking a light-hearted approach in the run up to the big election,
this does not mean that you should drop your guard when receiving emails from unknown senders that purport to contain news relating to the presidential campaign.
The body of the emails that have been analysed contain the usual mix of text-based lures and links to phishing sites, which are designed to steal your credentials when you visit them.
Unless you want to be fighting a rearguard action to prevent criminals from accessing your online banking system, personal and work email accounts, social network accounts,
and other sites containing sensitive personal information, the best course of action is to delete any suspicious-looking emails without opening them.
Removing Temptation from the Equation
With the best will in the world, some people are still tempted to open emails from unknown senders if the subject lines are related to topics in which they have a special interest.
In this regard, the presidential election themed spam emails are particularly dangerous as nearly everybody in the United States is interested in the outcome,
along with many other people in countries all over the world. Rather than having to rely on your ability to resist temptation,
a better alternative would be to employ an effective anti-spam filter to make sure that such emails never find their way to your inbox in the first place.