Actors behind a pill scam campaign are trying a new technique, betting on unconventional representation of URLs in spam messages to keep them undetected by email protection systems and URL block lists.
In a massive campaign observed by security researchers, the operators put in some effort to ensure wider reach of their messages promoting dubious pharmaceutical products.
The spammers combined convincing messages with IP addresses encoded in the hexadecimal numeral system that lead to fake pharma sites after a few redirects.
There is no malware involved. The purpose of the operation is to convince recipients to buy fake drugs, sugar pills, snake oil products, and items of doubtful quality.
Researchers at Trustwave tracking this campaign noticed an increased volume of messages going out in mid-July. [...]
