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For many of us that spend a good portion of our day-to-day lives online, the idea that people actually buy products from spam messages they receive in their inboxes seems laughable. However, new research from security company Marshal suggests quite the contrary.

The Results

Marshal polled over 600 people with 29.1% claiming to have purchased products from spam emails. It is hard to count this poll as completely accurate with that number of responses, but the statistic stands out as a surprising one nonetheless. Marshall Kirkpatrick at Read Write Web writes:

Of course these numbers should be taken with a giant grain of salt. The study was of just over 600 respondents who visited the Marshal website. The question they were asked appears to have been framed in a pretty presumptuous way. "What purchases have you made from spam?"

Kirkpatrick has a point, but as Marshal itself cites, even a Forrester Research poll from a few years ago found that 20% of 6,000 respondents had made purchases from spam. Considering that spam has not decreased, but more likely increased, in the time between the two studies, a 10% spike isn't as hard to believe as the fact that people are purchasing from spam at all.

The Reason It Won't End

If you've ever asked yourself why the spam problem continues to get worse, consider this your answer. It is apparently somewhat successful for the people sending it out, so why would they stop as long as they are getting away with it?

"A common misconception is that 'regular' people don't buy from spam," says Marshal. "But, you have to consider the types of products people are buying. It's pirated software, knock-off watches, counterfeit designer goods, cheap drugs and prescription medicines, pornography and other adult material. The Internet provides convenience and a degree of anonymity to people who want to buy illegal or restricted goods. It is a black market and spam has become a conventional means of advertising to a willing audience of millions of people who are purchasing from spam." 

There is clearly a market for this stuff, and this information is a little disturbing. Some people want to go down this "black market" road, so the rest of us have to pay for it by receiving endless illegal messages (some of which come complete with malware). If these people continue to fuel the spammers' profits, the constant flow of spam is likely never going to end.