Viral attacks in the UK dropped slightly in the latest month, but no matter. Phishing attacks continue to soar, along with spam volumes. Furthermore, the time between virus releases and patch availability is still narrow, making it difficult to defend against viruses without additional upfront mail filters checking things out as well.

This revelation might just make the British think twice about pawning all the responsibility off on their ISPs.

Not a single spammer prosecuted is the word from merry ol’ England. Ridiculously low fines and a ton of loopholes are to blame.

Spamroll thinks the UK should call on the United Nations for help with their spam issues. Then they can blame yet someone else when nothing gets done.

Spamroll says you better learn how to help yourself.

A recent survey of British netizens found that 57% have no spam filtering installed. Roughly 60% thought viruses and spam were the ISP’s problem, and less than 1 in 5 thought they were responsible for any necessary action at all.

Next up in the headlines - “UK drivers hold auto manufacturers responsible for the theft of their unlocked cars”. I expect a lot more stories of successful phishing attempts, and massive net outages resulting from worm plagues, coming out out that place.

If you have to read the sad story, you can find it here, compliments of The Register.

A few weeks back Spamroll led your way to a test of your ability to identify phishing attempts. This test was sculpted around some UK products and services (so obviously it was designed for the British), but that didn’t matter all too much.

Almost everyone failed.

I say “failed” because it only takes one phishing attempt to nab you. You spend the next six months of your life cleaning up your credit report while some crook is dancing around the streets, listening to music on the iPod he bought with your credit card.

According to this report, 93% of those surveyed in Britain would be changing their checking accounts; thats out of more than 11,000 polled. In the US, where a similar test has been circulating a little longer, more than 300,000 have taken it and roughly 96% of them would be staring at unknown credit card charges.

Its all about education folks, so time to go back to school.

Either Tony Blair has decided to adopt tenets of the US Constitution, or he is trying to start a movement for our politicians to pull their heads out of their arses. Either way, keeping religion and politics on separate grounds is a good thing.

Read Keep faith out of politics, says Blair, from The Guardian.

The Guardian covers a story about how students fair poorer in testing when they have access to computers to assist them in their studies. I end up getting the frank report from a technology blog. I don’t know which is worse, the computers in the classrooms, the calculators used to do the statistics for the study, or the journalist who buried the facts behind the policy flip flopping, at the bottom of the story.

In Pupils ‘do worse with computers’, a study notes that the students do worse when equiped with computers. This study contradicts results gleened from the same data, some time ago. The piece points out the source of the data near the end, and glosses over anything behind that data.

So I check out my daily technology news, one source of which is the ever poignant TechDirt, and end up getting the scoop (see How Computers Make Your Stupid… Or How Stats Are Used To Mislead?).

I guess I will just drop the mainstream news, and read more “dirt.” It seems more informative, and frankly, I love the sarcasm.

We hear a bit about home prices falling in the UK, and then the government pulls a tax rabbit out of the hat to spur more demand. Read SocietyGuardian.co.uk | Society | The change that will make some grin up north.

I wonder what politicians in the US could do to make home ownership more advantageous. Make mortgate interest a tax credit instead of a deduction? With interest rates on the rise, there isn’t much else left to subsidize the market.

It begs the question (again). Can residential price increases hold their own, without the persistently low cost of money advantages they enjoyed in the past?

With regard to my comment yesterday on housing prices “already beginning” to correct, here is a report from across the pond: Guardian Unlimited Money | News_ | House prices fell in December.

Note that interest rates in the UK crossed the trough before those in the US. Rates started climbing in Australia round about the same time, and the lines at open houses Down Under have long since disappeared. Also keep in mind that the UK is densely populated, and is loaded with real estate speculators (those buying properties with no intention of moving in and/or investing in developments), much like many of the areas in the US which have see the biggest price increases. Those speculators will go running for cover first. Then the games begin.

I may be way off base, but these three countries (the UK, Australia, and the US), have something else in common too, trade deficits. Wealth being sucked out of the systems, some (like the US) at an alarming rate. With price driven by indebtedness, and liquidity on shrink, I say…

Welcome to the global economy.