Malwares have increased by three times in 2008

[mauricio]

The publisher solutions for data protection Kaspersky released its report safety for the first half of 2008. Broadly speaking, the proliferation of threats has tripled over the first half of 2007. In all, there are 3,67,772 new malware that were detected in 2008, this represents an average of 61,295.33 per month.

Total number of malware detected - 1st half 2007 - 1st half 2008


Technologies relating to the "malware 2.0" have developed, especially in the form of Storm worm, a worm circulated by email, instant messaging or network. The dangers of rootkit, allowing access to a computer system on a machine already infected, remain important, especially as the antivirus software vendors are struggling to detect and provide tools for disinfection.

According to Kaspersky, community networks are transformed into real nests virus. Rather than continue to look for vulnerabilities in servers, the hackers simply deploy malware in the form of a link via the contacts embedded in the network. The main targets are Orkut and MySpace and then Facebook.

The mobile phone sector is no exception because hackers have targeted their efforts on the development platform J2ME to deploy to a broad majority of mobile phones. Nearly fifty worms have been identified and most of them send text messages to numbers to the hacker.



The editor divides these malicious programs into three categories: TrojWare or Trojans, the VirWare i.e. those who are able to re-program themselves and then others. Between 2007 and 2008, the share of TojWare is still strong and now represents 92% of global threats. In addition, the number of TrojWare is still growing, with an increase of 190% compared to 2007.



The rate of attacks in VBS or JavaScript has slightly decreased while attacks on the J2ME platform recorded an increase of 583%. Malware spreading via an Excel file (XSL) increased 840% especially for malware sent from China. One of the major developments concerning the attacks via the platform .NET (+955%), including a same virus can be spread not only on a computer, but also on a smart-phone with Windows Mobile. Finally, the palm rests with malware distributed in the form of a SWF file (+% in 8500) because of a vulnerability exploited by mass last spring: more than 250 variants have been identified.

[southparx]

Can anyone explain me who is benefited from these malware viruses etc? How can a virus be helpful to some people?