One in seven emails is spam

UK businesses are groaning under the weight of unsolicited email - but the worst may still be to come.

According to a survey of 160 IT managers conducted on behalf of security specialist MessageLabs, 15 per cent of all incoming business mail is spam.

As much as 10 per cent of employees' time is taken up in dealing with the wave of junk email, the survey said.

Not surprisingly, the problem is much worse in the US, where a similar survey found that half of respondents said that more than 30 per cent of the emails that arrive in their inboxes are unsolicited.

Three-quarters of the UK survey respondents said the problem of unwanted email will be 'much' or 'somewhat' worse in the coming year.

One of the issues that has dogged efforts to combat spam is working out exactly which emails are wanted and which aren't.

Not surprisingly, 90 per cent of survey respondents said that unsolicited promotional material from senders they didn't know was spam, but other categories of unsolicited email wasn't seen as spam.

Messages containing news and information were welcomed into the inbox by all but 12 per cent of IT managers. But 30 per cent regarded unwanted communications from their own company as spam.