‘Mortgage’ Still Among Top 10 Spam Subjects

Mortgage-related subject lines were among the most often used in spam e-mails during 2003, according to America Online. The Internet service provider said that among the top 10 most widely recognized subject lines in unsolicited e-mails was “Lowest mortgage rates.” Other popular real estate finance headers were “lower your mortgage rates,” “refinance” and “refi.”

Nonmortgage subject lines popularly used by spammers included Viagra Online, Online Pharmacy and Get Out of Debt, AOL reported.

Last March, the Federal Trade Commission filed a lawsuit against Boca Raton-based 30 Minute Mortgage Inc., its president and national sales director. Among other things, the FTC accused the defendants of sending out unsolicited “spam” email messages to consumers offering 3.95% mortgages when, in fact, the company was not a lender.

Dulles, Virg.-based AOL said survey results were based on data forwarded by its reported base of more than 24 million members over the last year and monitored by its Postmaster Team, which operates within AOL’s Anti-Spam Operations group.

An AOL manager said the tricks spammers attempted to use last year to bypass AOL’s anti-spam filters included: “randomized characters” in the e-mail subject line; the use of word variations, including “whitespace” insertions within words; misspellings within common spam words, as well as numeric substitutions for certain letters — the number “3” for an “E” and a number “1” for an “I,” and a number “0” for an “o.”

The TimeWarner subsidiary said it prevented nearly 500 billion spam e-mails from getting into members’ inboxes in 2003, which is an average of 15,000 less spams for each AOL member and an average of 40 less daily per account, according to the report.

In December 2002, AOL announced a legal victory over CN Productions who allegedly targeted AOL members with unwanted e-mail that advertised adult Web sites. AOL said it was awarded nearly $7 million in statutory damages — the largest amount it had obtained to date in its anti-spam legal efforts, and it was also the first case in which such an award was granted under the amended Virginia anti-spam statute, which provides that spammers can be assessed $25,000 for each day they send spam.

MortgageDaily.com‘s publisher says it sends email news alerts only to recipients who have registered or opted-in for these messages. In addition, an unsubscribe link is placed at the top and bottom of news alerts, the mortgage industry news publication said, and it works directly with AOL to automatically unsubscribe anyone who reports the news alerts as spam.