QUOTE
Malware Activity Up In August
Mike Sachoff
Staff Writer
2009-09-01
Network security provider Fortinet has released its August 2009 Threatscape report, which found an increase in malware activity during the month.
ZBot variants flooded cyberspace on July 24 with record levels: one through HTML/Agent.E, an attachment in an email, which used the popular eCard hook to attempt to steal and sell personal consumer information. The online gaming Trojan W32/OnlineGames.BBR maintained its first place position for the third consecutive month.
Israel entered the top five-region list for receiving high spam volume, while the U.S., Japan and France accounted for the remaining share of detected spam.
Marking a consistent trend of increasing software vulnerabilities, threat rates during August jumped from July. Of 168 new vulnerabilities detected, 62 were reported to be actively exploited in the wild, with a large portion of these attacked vulnerabilities rated as critical.
Critical vulnerabilities typically indicate a concern for remote code execution-an easy way for attackers to penetrate a system. Two in-the-wild vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office Web Components and in Adobe Reader/Flash were detected to have consistent exploit activity during the month.
"Threat activities for this month involved a few well-known schemes that are up to some new tricks, a good indication that cyber criminals weren't pulling out all the stops, but they certainly weren't taking a break during summer vacation," said Derek Manky, project manager, cyber security and threat research, Fortinet.
"With criminals counting on consumers to fall for virtually the same old tricks, it can't be stressed enough that we need to know whom and what to trust - this is an important element to a robust security model."
More information:
http://www.securitypronews.com/insiderrepo...UpInAugust.html
Mike Sachoff
Staff Writer
2009-09-01
Network security provider Fortinet has released its August 2009 Threatscape report, which found an increase in malware activity during the month.
ZBot variants flooded cyberspace on July 24 with record levels: one through HTML/Agent.E, an attachment in an email, which used the popular eCard hook to attempt to steal and sell personal consumer information. The online gaming Trojan W32/OnlineGames.BBR maintained its first place position for the third consecutive month.
Israel entered the top five-region list for receiving high spam volume, while the U.S., Japan and France accounted for the remaining share of detected spam.
Marking a consistent trend of increasing software vulnerabilities, threat rates during August jumped from July. Of 168 new vulnerabilities detected, 62 were reported to be actively exploited in the wild, with a large portion of these attacked vulnerabilities rated as critical.
Critical vulnerabilities typically indicate a concern for remote code execution-an easy way for attackers to penetrate a system. Two in-the-wild vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office Web Components and in Adobe Reader/Flash were detected to have consistent exploit activity during the month.
"Threat activities for this month involved a few well-known schemes that are up to some new tricks, a good indication that cyber criminals weren't pulling out all the stops, but they certainly weren't taking a break during summer vacation," said Derek Manky, project manager, cyber security and threat research, Fortinet.
"With criminals counting on consumers to fall for virtually the same old tricks, it can't be stressed enough that we need to know whom and what to trust - this is an important element to a robust security model."
More information:
http://www.securitypronews.com/insiderrepo...UpInAugust.html