Email spam is one of the primary means to facilitate the perpetration of internet fraud and the distribution of malware. The present research sought to examine the impact of routine activity theory at the national level on three forms of cybercrime perpetrated through email spam. A sample of 871,146 spam email messages sent in 2012 were divided into three categories: fraudulent emails, emails spreading malware, and non-serious spam emails. The measures were then aggregated by country and five measures of routine activity theory at the national level were tested for their impact on cybercrime among 120 nations. Concurrent with prior research, the results indicated that internet users per capita positively predicted all three forms of cybercrime. Unlike previous research, GDP presented a different relationship amongst all three outcomes: positive for spam, negative for fraud, and nonsignificant for malware. Implications of these findings and suggestions for future research are discussed.

电子邮件垃圾邮件是促进互联网欺诈和恶意软件传播的主要手段之一。本研究旨在研究例行活动理论在国家一级对通过电子邮件垃圾邮件实施的三种网络犯罪形式的影响。2012年发送的871,146封垃圾邮件样本分为三类：欺诈性电子邮件，传播恶意软件的电子邮件和非严重垃圾邮件。然后按国家汇总这些措施，并在国家层面测试了五种日常活动理论措施对120个国家/地区网络犯罪的影响。与先前的研究同时，结果表明，人均互联网用户对三种形式的网络犯罪都具有积极的预测作用。与先前的研究不同，GDP在所有三个结果之间呈现出不同的关系：对垃圾邮件为正面，对欺诈为负面，对恶意软件则无关紧要。讨论了这些发现的含义和对未来研究的建议。