{"id":66837,"date":"2016-12-02T15:08:40","date_gmt":"2016-12-02T23:08:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/securingtomorrow.mcafee.com\/?p=66837"},"modified":"2025-08-31T21:34:59","modified_gmt":"2025-09-01T04:34:59","slug":"unwanted-calendar-invitations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mcafee.com\/blogs\/internet-security\/unwanted-calendar-invitations\/","title":{"rendered":"Why You\u2019re Going to Have to Start Filtering Your Calendar Invitations"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometime in November, Apple users began receiving unwanted calendar invitations on their devices. These invitations featured \u201camazing savings\u201d and discounts on a variety of popular products. They were, of course, spam messages \u2014 akin to those you\u2019d find in an email inbox.<\/p>\n

But this \u201ccalendar spam\u201d is different than the usual phony email offer you\u2019d receive in your inbox. For one, users would suffer more invitations if they actively rejected an invitation. The reason for this is simple: rejecting an invitation lets the spammer know a user is actively monitoring a targeted account \u2014 a ripe target for more spam. What\u2019s worse, as The New York Times<\/a> reports, is the fact that putting an end to this deluge of spam requires multiple steps and some knowledge of cloud accounts and permissions. This, likely, won\u2019t be the last time we see new spamming techniques.<\/p>\n

Welcome to the new and improved version of spam, where abusers get instant feedback from targets and targets get unceasing invitations to a variety of hoaxes via email, on social media and, now, in their calendars. This evolution has been long in the making<\/a>. Let\u2019s take a quick look at why.<\/p>\n

Spammers know that, in most cases, email filters are advanced enough to detect and remove scams from a victim\u2019s inbox. The days of copying and blast-emailing from lists on the Dark Web, for the most part, are over. Instead of sending emails, spammers are using two tools to better advertise their illicit goods: social media and built-in connectivity tools.<\/p>\n

Spam has a strong presence on social media. Creating a fake account, whether on Facebook or Twitter, is fairly easy. Actors can then use a variety of social engineering techniques to either sucker users into spreading fake news or deals, or simply compromise an account. If successful, these attacks can be difficult to stop. A compromised account can help spammers directly relay illicit messages through chat and messenger applications. Users tricked into spreading fake content, either by liking or messaging, can make a similar impact. Regardless, both techniques are troublesome, as the illicit content spreads from trusted friends or family.<\/p>\n

But social media spamming is detectable and therefore blockable. Artificial intelligence can filter out quick-to-spread spam posts. As The Next Web notes<\/a>, verification methods, such as requiring new users to enter a code sent over text messages, can cut down on the number of fake accounts a spammer can create.<\/p>\n

This, likely, has pushed spammers to exploit built-in connectivity tools. Built-in connectivity tools are small programs allowing users to easily connect through an off-site server like iCloud. If you back your photos up to the cloud, sync calendar invitations through the internet or use a similar service, you use built-in connectivity tools. By abusing these tools, spammers leveraged a new method of reaching victims.<\/p>\n

In this case, according to MacWorld, abusers exploited an email-related feature on iCloud, allowing the spam invitations to be set as recurring events that would repeatedly surface. Users would unwittingly exacerbate this problem by rejecting invitations, alerting spammers that eyes were on their messages and could, potentially, be tricked into accepting a phony invitation.<\/p>\n

What to Do When You Encounter These Messages<\/h2>\n

As of now, Apple is actively working on a fix for this exploit. Of course, it is not the only organization that will need to do so \u2014 built-in connectivity tools are becoming increasingly common and susceptible to exploits. So what should you do if you encounter one of these messages? How can you block these messages while still accepting legitimate invitations?<\/p>\n

The solutions can be a bit involved. You can find guides from Gizmodo here<\/a>, Ars Technica here<\/a> and 9-to-5 Mac here<\/a>. But the elements to blocking calendar spam is simply this:<\/p>\n