WhiteHat Finds Website Security Has Drastically Improved

An examination of thousands of websites across a dozen industries has found a major reduction in the number of serious vulnerabilities exposing the properties to hackers.

The average number of serious vulnerabilities found in 2011 on the 7,000 websites monitored by WhiteHat Security fell 66 percent to 79 from 230 in 2010, according to the vendor's annual report, released Wednesday. The decline in security flaws has been falling steadily since 2007, when the number was 1,111.

The falling rate shows website managers are more focused on plugging holes. "Awareness is building and people are getting better in the fixing [of vulnerabilities]," Jeremiah Grossman, founder and chief technology officer of WhiteHat, said. "Web security is definitely getting more important, because the bad guys are showing that they're perfectly capable and willing to hack Web sites that aren't do the best that the can."