The browser mafia
By Davey Winder in Editorial
Posted in Blog, Security, IBM on
According to IBM, or rather the straight out of a gangster movie sounding IBM X-Force to be precise, your web browser is under siege from organised crime gangs. The 2007 X-Force Security report details something of an expected rise in the sophistication of attacks, and an increase in the rate at which victims computers are being compromised. There is, X-Force says, a ‘complex and sophisticated criminal economy’ which has developed to capitalise on known web vulnerabilities, and underground brokers are now delivering the necessary tools to enable those who would screw you over to do just that and avoid detection by way of obfuscation or camouflage.
The report says that in 2006 only a small percentage of attackers employed camouflaging techniques. Compare and contrast with the first half of 2007 when some 80 percent of attacks did just that, and the 100% that were doing it by the end of the year. Using such by now commonplace techniques, the criminal element can all too easily infiltrate a system and compromise the data upon it. Don’t laugh this off as being just a problem for the home user either, X-Force quite rightly reminds us that when attackers invade an enterprise machine they can steal sensitive company information or use that compromised machine to gain access to other corporate assets behind the firewall.
“Never before have such aggressive measures been sustained by Internet attackers towards infection, propagation and security evasion. While computer security professionals can claim some victories, attackers are adapting their approaches and continuing to have an impact on users’ experiences,” said Kris Lamb, operations manager, X-Force Research and Development for IBM Internet Security Systems. “The Storm Worm provides a microcosm of the kinds of threats users faced in 2007. All in all, the exploits used to spread Storm Worm are a blend of the various threats tracked by X-Force, including spam, phishing and drive-by-downloads by way of Web browser exploitation.”
The X-Force report also reveals that:
- The number of critical computer security vulnerabilities disclosed increased by 28 percent, a substantial upswing from years past.
- The overall number of vulnerabilities reported for the year went down for the first time in 10 years.
- Out of all the vulnerabilities disclosed last year, only 50 percent can be corrected through vendor patches.
- Nearly 90 percent of 2007 disclosed vulnerabilities are remotely exploitable.
Rated: 100% (1 votes)
Loading ...Comment by - February 18, 2008 on 10:11 am
good article. ….
nice info ..
thanks
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