WASHINGTON (Reuters) - "Spam" e-mail, used for years to sell snake-oil medicine, penny stocks and suspiciously low mortgages, is now being used to sell neo-Nazi ideology as well.
A new computer worm sent right-wing German messages to millions of computers over the weekend in what anti-virus experts said was a sign that spam has become a tool for propagandists as well as scam artists.
"We have seen a trend in which worm authors are using spam not to hawk goods, but as a tool for political propaganda," said Scott Chasin, chief technical officer for the anti-virus firm MX Logic.
Chasin and other experts said the messages were sent by computers that had been infected with a new variant of the Sober worm, which turns computers into "zombies" that can be used as a base for attacks.
Experts described the amount of spam generated as "staggering."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050516/us_nm/tech_spam_dc_3