The volume of virus-ladened emails dropped to a record low last month, according to email security firm BlackSpider Technologies. It reports that virus contaminated emails accounted for just 0.79 per cent of inbound emails during April 2006.

In December 2005 the number of virus-infected emails reached 3.93 per cent of all emails, a record high. BlackSpider cautions, however, that the drop in email viruses it has witnessed is more likely to be a sign of changed tactics by cybercriminals than evidence that net security threats as a whole are on the wane. The number of phishing emails seen by BlackSpider in April rose by more than a third (35 per cent) on March’s figure.

James Kay, CTO, BlackSpider Technologies, said: "Malware writers are giving with one hand but taking with the other – yes, the drop in virus emails is encouraging, but a surge in phishing emails shows they are simply making their attacks more targeted." ®