Malware on the increase

The last six months have seen online threats continue to rise alarmingly, according to security experts.

In its six month virus summary, anti-virus company F-Secure has revealed that number of viruses doing the rounds has increased from 110,000 to approximately 150,000 by the end of the year.

According to the company, mass assaults using worms to attack computers dropped with only two major outbreaks, one in September with the Zotob worm and Sober variants flooding email inboxes last month.

F-Secure also reveal that 2005 was characterised by phishing attempts either directly to online banking customers or exploiting natural disasters, like the Tsunami.

According to F-Secure, 2005 also saw an increase in the number of mobile phone viruses being written, but other security company, Sophos said that they “remain insignificant compared to the larger number of viruses targeting Windows desktop computers”.

Security experts warn computer users that insufficiently protected computers are coming under attack faster than before, because of the increase in broadband connections.

Computer users should make sure that their computer are protected against malware by updating their anti-virus solutions in regular basis.

F-Secure
Sophos