More than 20m Malware Strains Spotted During Q1-2015; PandaLabs

According to one new study by PandaLabs the security company, over 20m strains of malware have been identified during January-March 2015.

Most of these strains represent editions of existing malicious programs instead of fresh malware, created for bypassing security software's detection, and behaving similarly as biological viruses.

The most frequently prevalent malicious programs are Trojans followed with viruses, worms as well as spyware/adware.

From the statistics that PandaLabs garnered it's evident that over 25% of PCs installed in UK that have PandaLabs' software loaded contracted malware with the company fast outlining that it does not mean they were contaminated.

The figure increased to 48% in the case of Chinese PCs as well as 34% in the case of American ones. Worldwide, the infection percentage acquired 36.51%, growing by 6% from 2014 that implies that a maximum of 1 in 3 PCs could be hijacked.

Among those countries with least infections, the European nations dominate with Norway on top of the list with 22.07% of the overall contaminated computers. Other low malware contamination countries are Denmark, Finland and Venezuela with 28.18%, 28.59% and 33.35% respectively, amidst others.

Reportedly, ransomware assaults dominated during the first quarter of 2015, particularly the CryptoLocker malware, and now it can be safely said that this kind of assault is becoming more favorable for cyber-criminals towards churning income from organizations' filched data.

Such happened with 10 firms within the 'oil & gas' sector of maritime transportation that became victimized with ransomware assaults. Panda Security revealed this within their report prepared over a hacking outbreak that was titled "Operation Oil Tanker: The Phantom Menace" that struck oil tankers.

PandaLabs' Technical Director Luis Corrons at Panda Security explains that within this particular instance, no malware was used rather genuine files worked with regularly. Itproportal.com reported this, June 2, 2015.

According to Corrons, one should always remember that the only objective of cyber-crooks is garnering information and money, and with more digitization, cyber-threats become more prevalent. In 2015, more ransomware assaults are expected along with fresh scams proliferating via mobile applications and social media, he concludes. Net-security.org reported this, June 2, 2015.

» SPAMfighter News - 6/12/2015