Cyber Attacks Increasingly Sophisticated Says Symantec

In its Internet Security Threat Report, Volume 16, Symantec states that targeted attacks are skyrocketing in frequency but also sophistication.

The anti-virus security company found that cyber criminals were increasingly looking at social networks as a fertile ground for their operations. The main way they attacks, says Symantec is through shortened URLs which they use for spreading malware and phishing attacks. They also make use of the news feed feature to spread shortened links to hundreds and even thousands of users, according to a company press release. Symantec found that in 2010, 65 percent of malicious links that were found in news feeds were in fact shortened URLs.

The report also states that there were 286 million unique variants of malware in 2010 that were responsible for over 3.1 billion attacks on computers. There was also a 93 percent increase in the volume of attacks that were web-based, says the Wall Street Journal.

Criminals also exploited vulnerabilities in Java to launch attacks toolkits which are software programs that can easily be used by both beginners and experts to attack computer networks, says Symantec. Java accounted for 17 percent of all vulnerabilities tied to browser plug-ins in 2010, and the Phoenix toolkit was responsible for the highest number of web-based attacks.

Mobile phone platforms are also an important breeding ground for attacks, found Symantec, saying that in 2010, most malware attacks against mobile devices were in the form of Trojan Horse programs that looked like legitimate applications.

“Overall, it’s becoming a much more mature underground market,” said Symantec security strategist Sian John to Eweek Europe UK. “Everything’s moving on, as it has been for years, from being about kudos to being about making money and the market. The targeted attacks, the growing sophistication, the use of social networking, the attacks on mobile devices, all link back to that. We’re seeing a growing commercial element to the underground economy,” he added.

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Rosa is a professional journalist who holds a minor in Communications (print journalism), as well as a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree in International Affairs. We are extremely pleased that she has joined out team.

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