BEIJING, Jan. 26 -- UK antivirus company Sophos has released its ranking of spammers for the fourth quarter of 2005, with the United States still topping the list.

    Dubbed the "dirty dozen", Sophos' list of 12 countries in the period from October to December 2005 has United States in first position with 24.5 percent. The latest figures mark the first time that U.S. accounts for less than one quarter of all spam relayed.

    The U.S. is closely followed by China, with 22.3 percent, according to Sophos. South Korea comes in third with 9.7 percent.

    Ron O'Brien, senior security analyst with the Lynnfield-based Sophos, said: "Officials in the United States have cracked down considerably on spammers, by giving-out harsh sentences to those convicted - that's good news for organizations and consumers. Unfortunately, email users around the world are still being bombarded by un-solicited messages."

    Prominent among other findings, Sophos found the level of non-English language spam continuing to increase. A majority of spam is being relayed by "zombie computers" -- which are responsible for relaying over 60 percent of the world's spam -hijacked by Trojan horses, worms and viruses.

    There is also considerable increase in "pump-and-dump" stock spam, which is geared to artificially inflate stock prices before spammers sell shares at higher profit.

    As a safety measure, Sophos has advised computer users to keep their anti-virus software up-to-date, use a properly configured firewall, and install the latest operating system security patch. Enditem

    (Agencies)