MP3 Pump And Dump

In a twist on a classic technique, spammers hype stocks by mp3.

Pump and dump has been a common spam technique with stocks in the past, but lately it’s taken a new twist, according to a story by ZDNet.   Instead of a regular e-mail extolling the qualities of a stock you’ve never heard of, now the spammers are sending out mp3 files. There’s no text or header on the mail, simply an attached mp3 file named after a popular artist.   Play it, however, and instead of a song, you find a female speaking voice praising the stock of EXTO.   According to a blog entry on the site of security company Sophos,   “The messages are quite random, some have multiple mime parts where others have a single mimepart. Most, but not all, have no subject. The mp3 tracks themselves are randomized. The voice is female and multitone, the pitch varies between mp3 and seems to be adjusted throughout the track. The file sizes are also varied.”   It’s certainly an interesting variation on classic spam, but one that’s more expensive. It also raises the question as to whether malware could be sent this way in the future, although experts tend to think it would be doing by renaming an executable file with an .mp3 extension.