Majority of malware attacks go undetected

UNDETECTED : Majority of malware attacks go undetected

Sue Marquette Poremba

August 11 2008

http://www.scmagazineus.com/Majority-of-malware-attacks-go-undetected/article/113673/

Most malicious internet attacks go undetected by anti-virus software, according to a report released Monday by Cyveillance, a digital intelligence company.

Data collected from several top anti-virus vendors during a 30-day period showed that more than half of the malware attacks went undetected. In addition, the Cyveillance 1H Online Fraud Report stated that malware attacks delivered via the web have more than doubled in frequency compared to the same period during the previous year.

Essentially, new malware threats are developed quicker than the anti-virus companies can develop fixes, James Brooks, director of product management at Cyveillance told SCMagazineUS.com on Monday.

“The AV companies are getting tens of thousands of new attack samples a week,” he said. “And a lot of these samples have to be broken down by their security labs, and you can only process so much at a time.”

Gartner analyst Peter Firstbrook said the Cyveillance test seems accurate.

The most important change going on is the division of labor in the attacker underground, which is causing fast-changing malware, he said.

“Today the threat environment has transformed to a more complex supply chain where players are highly specialized and consequently more productive," he said. "Vulnerabilities are sold to ‘software developers' who create packaged malware generation software that can then be used by multiple types of attackers and are capable of generating multiple unique targeted attacks and are continuously updated with new exploits."

According to Firstbrook, “Some [malware packages] have even gone open source. Consequently, the ability to launch a sophisticated targeted attack is no longer limited to those that have technical knowledge, increasing the potential universe of attackers.”