Sophos Cloud Optix
Spammers seem keener than ever to customise their messaging and value propositions to the differences in their various target markets. Nowhere is this clearer than in the pharmaceutical spam sites and their most well-known protagonist Canadian Pharmacy. Not only does the page — which is often hosted on a hacked webserver — attempt to recognize the country you’re browsing from and change all prices to your local currency, but it also changes the entire name of the site. When browsing from the UK, “Canadian Pharmacy” becomes “United Pharmacy” and the maple leaves are replaced by Union Jacks.
A slightly more bizarre change is that UK users shoppin’ to stop the floppin’ get another unexpected bonus: the image of the labcoated doctor on the front page changes from a smug-looking middle aged guy with a stethoscope to another smug-looking middle aged guy with slightly nicer hair and less resemblance to a surprised chicken. Through the miracle of modern digital editing techniques, the labcoat remains unperturbed.
The following animated gif demonstrates the metamorphosis in full.
