E-mail is already a key tool by which viruses like MyDoom spread all over the world, and that key relationship is set to increase. Viruses writers and spammers (who are both just as bad as each other if you ask me) will join forces and create a new generation of annoying problems, according to recent reports from a security group.

Firewalls still don't seem to be doing the job they are supposed to. New York-based MessageLabs studied some 5.6 billion e-mails from January to June this year - one in 12 contained some sort of virus that had just slipped past firewalls.

MessageLabs fear that a union between viruses and spam would introduce the profit motive to virus writing, and would provide an incentive for more professional quality viruses to be produced in future.