To print: Click here or Select File and then Print from your browser's menu

This story was printed from silicon.com, located at http://www.silicon.com/

Story URL: http://software.silicon.com/security/0,39024655,39204404,00.htm

Security threat: One web page infected every five seconds
But good news for email

By Vivian Yeo

Published: Thursday 24 April 2008

Web threats have risen significantly in the first quarter of 2008, with one web page being infected every five seconds, according to a report from security vendor Sophos.

Released Wednesday, Sophos said in its Security Threat Report that an average of more than 15,000 web pages were compromised daily between January and March.

Security from A to Z

Click on the links below to find out more...

A is for Antivirus
B is for Botnets
C is for CMA
D is for DDoS
E is for Extradition
F is for Federated identity
G is for Google
H is for Hackers
I is for IM
J is for Jaschan (Sven)
K is for Kids
L is for Love Bug
M is for Microsoft
N is for Neologisms
O is for Orange
P is for Passwords
Q is for Questions
R is for Rootkits
S is for Spyware
T is for Two-factor authentication
U is for USB sticks/devices
V is for Virus variants
W is for Wi-fi
X is for OS X
Y is for You
Z is for Zero-day

In contrast, the daily average for the entire 2007 was about 6,000, or one infected web page every 14 seconds.

About 79 per cent of compromised web pages tracked this year belong to legitimate websites, Sophos reported. The company noted that the sites of Fortune 500 companies, government agencies and even security vendors, have fallen prey to malware attacks. In addition, there has been a rise in spam-related web pages - a daily average of 23,300 such pages were tracked during the first three months of 2008. This is equivalent to one spam web page being discovered every three seconds.

Threats circulated via email, on the other hand, appeared to have cooled off during the first quarter of this year. According to Sophos, only one in 2,500 email messages contained malware - 40 per cent fewer than 2007, where one in 909 email messages were infected.

The US remains the top contributor of spam, followed by Russia, Turkey, China including Hong Kong and Brazil.