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ESET Releases List of Top Ten Malware for April 2009

According to ESET, an online security company, malware detections during April 2009 was the highest for Win32/Conficker. The worm contributed nearly 8.70% of all malicious codes the company detected.

Describing Win32/Conficker, ESET says that it is a worm that spreads across the network. It proliferates through the exploitation of a new security flaw within the Windows OS. This flaw, which is found in the RPC sub-system, allows an attacker to exploit it remotely even in the absence of authentic user credentials. In fact, based on the type of its version, the Conficker can also propagate through infected removable devices like USB sticks or via unprotected shared files.

Coming next on ESET's April 2009 malware list is INF/Autorun. It appears that infected USB sticks are increasingly used by malicious people as attack device. ESET said that it had recorded as much as 8.55% of malware propagated through this means during April 2009. Since USB sticks can be carried around and are quite simple to use, they are fast becoming the preferred medium for malware distributors seeking to disseminate malicious code.

Following INF/Autorun is Trojan/rootkit W32/PSW.OnLineGames placed third. This malware was responsible for 7% of all malicious codes detected. ESET further states that W32/PSW.OnLineGames comprises a Trojan family having rootkit and keylogging features that harvests data for online games such as the credentials for playing them. Typically, this data is transmitted to the Trojan's controller at some remote location.

Ranking No.4 on ESET's list is a general group of malicious code, Win32/Agent, which accounted for 3.51% of the total malware detected.

After this malware, Win32/TrojanDownloader, contributing 1.03% of all malicious codes detected, occupied the fifth position. The malware, according to ESET, contains a variety of codes that basically load and install more malware on the infected computer.

Further down on ESET's list and placed sixth was INF/Conficker. WMA/TrojanDownloader.GetCodec and Win32/Qhost occupied the seventh and eighth place on the list. These programs accounted for 1.52%, 1.38% and 1.23% respectively of the entire malicious codes that ESET detected.

Finally on No.9 and No.10 positions were Win32/Toolbar.MywebSearch and Win32/Autorun, accounting for 1.14% and 0.79% respectively of all malware that the security company detected during April 2009.

Related article: ESET Discusses Malware Writers’ Trend

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