Malware for Money: Zafi, Sober, Netsky Still Haunting Net
As virus writing is increasing, average time to infection is decreasing, according to a Danish Internet security firm. Sophos' chart of activity for the first six months of 2005 reports there is now a 50 percent chance of being infected by an Internet worm in just 12 minutes of being online using an unprotected, unpatched Windows PC.
Patrick Hinojosa, CTO for Panda Software U.S., said trojans that allow a cybercriminal to remotely run code on another's computer without the user's consent is a major trend he has seen since June 2004. It is the most persistent infector of machines, he added, and it's not stopping. "The virus writer's complexion has changed in the past year or so," Hinojosa said. "We've moved away from the major activity coming from script kitties writing malware for bragging rights to people sending spam and anonymously performing other activities with a money motive."
