Spam Propagation Risk Vector

⇤ Compromised Systems Risk Category

The Spam Propagation risk vector is composed of spambots, where a device on a company’s network is unsolicitedly sending commercial or bulk email (spam). If spam originates from email addresses or devices within a company’s network, this is an indication of an infection.

If a company offers a bulk email-sending service, such as a digital marketing company that sends marketing material on behalf of their customers, they are excluded from this risk vector. These companies are identified with a “Bulk Email Sender” label on their company overview page.

See data collection methods or the criteria for classifying findings as Spam Propagation.

Risks

• Damage to a company’s reputation.
• Abuses company resources.
• Legitimate email from the company may be flagged as spam and will not reach its intended recipient.
• Increases the risk of additional malware entering organizational systems.

Grading

Compromised Systems risk vectors are graded in the same manner. They are weighted evenly across the risk category and have a lifetime of 180 days.

Remediation

Review Spam Propagation findings and track down infections.

• Conduct a thorough security review of the machine (malware & antivirus sweep).
• Review services used on the machine, harden firewall rules.
• Improve employee computer safety training (phishing, installing unapproved software).

Finding Behavior

User-requested rescans are not available for Compromised Systems risk vectors.

As the negatively impacting finding gets older, you will gradually get points back.