2010: another 'good' year for malware and other security risks

Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 05 April 2011 14:00

Business IT - Security

Threats to conventional PCs and mobile devices skyrocketed during 2010, according to a new report from Symantec, with social networking and mobile devices playing significant roles.

"Australia is facing exactly what the rest of the world is seeing," said Peter Sparkes, senior manager, managed security services Asia Pacific and Japan. The number of threats is increasing, and "Australia is seen as a good target" especially for credit card fraud as it is among the wealthier countries.

Symantec sees targeted attacks as a "key trend" continuing into 2011. he said, especially on governments and critical infrastructure companies. Australian organisations have been targeted - usually by organised crime -  but not in attacks on the scale of Aurora or Stuxnet,

According to Symantec officials, individuals are also falling victim to targeted attacks. Access to personal information is often the motivation for such attacks.

Social networks are being increasingly used to spread malware, and such attacks often involve the use of shortened URLs. Posting a malicious but seemingly harmless link on one compromised account can rapidly propagate it to thousands of other users.

Mr Sparkes noted that despite the growing use of social networking, email is still being used maliciously and with growing sophistication. Such messages are being more carefully edited to eliminate spelling mistakes and other relatively obvious shortcomings, and various opening lines are being market-tested for their effectiveness in hooking readers.

What sort of hooks are being used, and what can we expect during 2011? See page 2.