Studying the logs of my anti-spam project showed some of the effects of sanctions on spam patterns that really surprised me, but they make sense.
A few weeks back I blogged about my analysis of 16 months worth of data acquired through my anti-spam project. I started looking at it all again a few nights back and found an interesting change. I noticed a sudden drop in the amount of spam coming in from Russia. So I dug through the data to see when it started happening, just for idle curiousity. This has been such a consistent pattern, so, why? Enter the effects of sanctions on spam!
After looking through the data, seeing time frames I was a little stumped. So I started thinking about why, and it hit me while watching the news today. The spam started decreasing substantially beginning around the time of economic sanctions being placed against Russia due to their invasion of Ukraine.
Me, not being any sort of economic guru, I thought about it. It makes sense, having worked in financial technology, and with OFAC and sanctions, I get it. The spam stops because the possibility of profit stops.
Even if their spamming tactics worked, its illegal to move money from the US to Russia. So they could have a successful money extraction from an individual but they would never see it.
Yesterday I talked to a colleague, and he mentioned that cyber security folks noticed the same thing. I find that interesting. As much fun as I poke at politics, moreso politicians, its nice to see some of this actually has an effect. If most are like me we simply see stuffed shirts blowing smoke. But it does seem there actually has been an impact for the good. The effects of sanction on spam is a good thing for the US cyber security industry!