Spammers jump on swine flu

Swine flu has been a massively popular story on the web in recent days - a fact that has not been missed by spammers.

Several emails in Web User's Inbox this week have used subject lines such as "Swine flu worldwide!" and contain links to sites selling various types of goods.

"Anytime there is a global headline such as 'Swine Flu Pandemic' it gets people's attention and they want as much information and breaking news as possible," security expert Tony Bradley said on the About.com website.

Track swine flu cases on Google Maps

"Attackers know this and prey on that fact to lure people into becoming victims of malware or phishing attacks or conning them into spending money in some way," he continued.

According to Google, search terms such as 'swine flu symptoms' and 'swine virus' are currently popular in the US, where dozens of cases have now been reported.

Swine flu frequently asked questions (PDF)

There is even a Google Flu Trends site, launched in November 2008, which tracks cases of influenza in the US.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has published advice on its website about swine influenza, also known as H1N1, answering questions about the safety of pork products.

The WHO said that though human-to-human infection is rare, if the virus develops a more efficient way of transferring in human communities a pandemic is not out of the question.

A new Google map lets you see information about swine flu cases by country and another Google map tracks the movement of air passengers between the US and Mexico.

However, health authorities in the UK insist that the country is well protected and that drugs stockpiled in the case of a mass outbreak would be effective in fighting the H1N1 strain.

Swine flu timeline in Google Earth