New Malware Poses Continuous Danger for Organizations

A fresh study by Palo Alto Networks discovered over 700 distinct malicious programs over a 3-month span that infected enterprise networks and of which 57% were new to security researchers, thus published SecurityWeek on November 8, 2011.

Moreover, the study found that approximately 15% of the malware that were newly detected caused infected computers to connect with command-and-control servers that possibly hackers controlled.

Senior Security Analyst Wade Williamson at Palo Alto Networks stated that it was slightly surprising to find the sheer number of unknown malicious programs as well as how frequently they infected live networks. Usually, malicious programs not seen earlier tended to be the main cause of any well-planned assault, therefore, Alto Network's study truly emphasized how important it was to develop fresh anti-malware for the IT professionals, the analyst contended. SoftPedia reported this on November 9, 2011.

Furthermore, according to Williamson, the capability for spotting, investigating and rectifying unfamiliar malicious programs required giving attention while devising threat prevention approaches just like URL and IPS filtering were utilized in the present time.

Additionally, the study discovered that Web software of various kinds produced zero-day malware, as also did the conventional e-mail and HTTP web-browsing traffic that typically related to malware distribution.

Williamson observed that the above discovery was significant as several organizations merely scrutinized FTP and/or present day e-mail traffic for malicious programs, however, didn't have the capability for scrutinizing Web software for the same. Also software, which channeled through HTTP alternatively any different protocol, could have malicious content that conventional anti-malware solutions typically failed to detect. Those were instances of the major answers to why plentiful malware remained undetected since most organizations merely concentrated on scrutinizing the e-mail software they used, the analyst added.

For malware, Palo Alto Networks therefore produces fresh signature definitions in connection with both the malware as well as any traffic it causes. Subsequently, the company distributes these signature definitions as well as routine updates, while also facilitates the computer operator with an assessment about the malware's exact activity, whom it attacked and what was its source, so that action could be taken for countering it.

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» SPAMfighter News - 11/17/2011