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Global Spread of Malicious Viruses and Attacks on Major Servers in 2008 ? What?s in Store for You in 2009?

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More viruses and more spam email will come, and you thought you had seen it all now, just wait and see what you will be exposed to in 2009.

The global security network of Symantec has put together an overview of the most common threats and trends in 2008. They have also tried to look into the crystal ball and see what we will struggle with in the year to come.

The amount will increase as well as smarter threats will arrive into the market, developed by more sophisticated and professional developers. This will be the trend we are looking at for 2009 and beyond.

1. New variations and groups of threats
The hackers do not mass distribute malicious codes any more, but sends out larger groups of threats in a smaller scale. This type of malicious code consists of millions and millions of various threats that mutates and spreads very quickly. The Trojan Farfli that was discovered in July 2007 is a group of threats that just behaves like that.

2. False and confusing programs
False safety and service programs or so-called scare ware that promise to secure or clean up the users computer is also a threat type.
When you install these software’s you also install a Trojan that creates false and misleading results and keeps the computer a hostage until you pay to fix these made up threats.

3. Net based attacks
Well trusted web sites are a focus for lots of malicious activities. In 2008 Symantec saw that these web sites were the main target.

4. Black market
The black market has matured and become a very effective global market where stolen goods and crime related services are offered for billions of USD. Between July 2007 and June 2008 Symantec found that the total value of the offered products and services in the black market would be an estimated 276 billion USD.

5. Data crime
The extent of data crimes and types of them illustrates the need for strategies and technologies to hinder loss of data. In today’s economic climate there is a natural process to do mergers and acquisitions of companies. People have to be let go, and therefore protection of sensitive information becomes more imperative than ever. As lots of companies are knowledge driven, the immaterial products living in a company becomes of essence to protect to exposure towards competitors or criminals.

6. Spam
Bill Gates stated in 2004 that in two years the spam problem will be solved. During 2008 the spam level was on around 78% until they closed down the hosting company called McColo in November 2008. The spam level decreased with 65% when this happened. Spam filters have become more sophisticated the last few years, and therefore more effective to take away the most ordinary spam mails, but that does not mean the spammers have given up the battle, by far not.

7. Net phishing
Net phisher’s were active during 2008 and they used topics in the news like the American election to utilize more sophisticated hacking techniques to get the users to enter the traps. Tool boxes for net phishing are available for those interested, which contributes to the problem of net phishing.

8. Vulnerability in web browsers or plug-ins
Net specific vulnerabilities are often used in connection with so-called plug-ins to the web browsers. These can be used by the hackers to perform sophisticated net based attacks.

What should you fear in 2009?

According to Symantec these are some of the major topics you will struggle with in 2009.

1. Explosion of new malicious codes.
The new type of malicious codes consist of millions of various attack or threats which mutates like a larger more malicious program
This creates a unlimited number of various instances of evil codes. Information caught up by Symantec Global Intelligence Network illustrate that we are at a road crossing at the moment. It is at the moment created more malicious codes than real software programs around the world. The new and upcoming threats demands new and more competent methods to discover threats, like aware security.

2. Advanced net threats
As net services increases and web browsers in larger degree use common standards for interpretation of script languages, an increase in net based threats will continue.

3. Financial Crisis
Lots of attacks will utilize the economic crisis to its own purposes. Net phishing will send fake messages that certain banks will close, or make offers of quick loans or refinancing. Several crime attempts against people that have got their houses possessed, against unemployed people with offers of work from home and more imitating job related web pages can be expected as well.

4. Social networks
During 2008 the makicious activity around social network pages increased. The typical activity was net phishing of user names and passwords and/or use of a social context to get users to get into a trap set up by the hackers. Spammers in certain regions in EMEA have marketed the social network places very aggressive. One reached for instance over 2 million Symantec customers. These threats become more important for larger companies IT- departments since the younger generation use these in job connection.

5. Spam level increases
During the period the net hosting company McColo was closed Symantec saw a 65 percent reduction in spam activity. It is expected that the spam levels will be back to 75-80 percent during 2009. So-called command and control systems will be re-established which will lead spammers to use the more dynamic peer to peer bottnets. In the unsafe economic climate we have and will have for a while , more net hosting companies will be willing to facilitate spam activities to sustain its economic targets.

6. Safety on virtual machines
Virtualization technologies will be incorporated in security solutions to create an environment that is protected from the chaos that exist in the normal operational systems environment. Virtualization offers a secure environment for those security components that protects the ordinary operating systems.