Security - News

In a year when the virus world has seen an almost 50 per cent reduction in outbreaks compared to the same time in the previous year, other malware trends continue to show no stopping. Despite the efforts of companies like F-Secure to eradicate spam from email servers and private mailboxes, this modern plague continued to spread in the first half of 2005. Another trend in malware-writing is the rapid increase in new trojans and bots. Unlike the more indiscriminate assaults by viruses and worms, trojans can be delivered with precision to target organisations via email attachments or links to websites. In the same time frame, mobile viruses continue to make news. So far, the worst damage has been shown by a Trojan called Skulls, a malicious SIS file Trojan that replaces the system applications with non-functional versions, so that all but the phone's basic functionality is disabled. More worryingly for smartphone owners is the arrival of Commwarrior - a mobile virus that spreads both via Bluetooth and MMS messages, which was first reported in the wild in Ireland already in January 2005.

Autor: JP