Modern Malware is Increasingly Wreaking Havoc on Firms, says Malwarebytes

According to a new survey commissioned by security firm Malwarebytes, vicious nature of current malware is inflicting havoc on some companies forcing security experts to re-examine the present security policies and to think about spending on modernizing protection methods to detect attacks.

Enterprise Strategy Group, on behalf of Malwarebytes, recently conducted a survey on 315 security workers at firms in North America. The result of the survey shows that 74% of survey respondents have bettered their security budgets in the last two years due to increasingly refined malware threats.

The result also showed that 29% of respondent organizations which experienced malware attack believe that increasing use of social network is the cause of those attacks.

On average, it takes 57% of respondent's time to detect that an IT asset has been compromised by malware in 19% days. It has been found that 85% of IT security professionals were worried about massive cyber-attacks which could affect critical infrastructure like economy and/or national security.

62% of the survey respondents believe that host-based security software of theirs is not successful in identifying zero-day web attacks and other types of malware devised to bypass the security software and continue silently on systems.

According to the study, changes are being made by some organizations. About 39% of those surveyed noted that a bunch of security analysts especially dedicated for malware intel and analysis was formed at their organization and about 31% of business enterprises invested in detection of incident and response services.

Cbronline.com published a statement on 25th July, 2013 quoting a comment of ESG Senior Principal Analyst Jon Oltsik saying, "When it comes to managing malware risk, it would be best for enterprises to implement a covered approach using proactive and immediate lines of defense through their networks."

Oltsik said that antivirus software plays a key role in protecting organizations but it should not be the only method to prevent malware attacks.

He concluded that sometimes biggest vulnerability in an organization is computer users because user's actions can greatly impact computer security and hence educating them on potential threats and how to avoid them should be the priority.

» SPAMfighter News - 8/3/2013