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Submitted by: Bill Hickey
NCVA List Master
NRT-0097 Criminals Behind Most Malware:
Sophisticate hackers worldwide are banding together in highly efficient crime rings, according to Symantec's recently released Security Threat Report cited in an online IT journal.
The United States is also home to more than half of the world's "underground economy servers" - typically corporate computers that have been commandeered to facilitate clandestine transactions involving stolen data and may be compromised for as little as two hours or as long as two weeks.
The worldwide number of bot-infected computers rose about 29% from the previous six months, to more than 6 million computers, while the number of servers controlling them declined by about 25% to around 4,700. Symantec said the decrease signifies that bot network owners are consolidating to expand their networks, creating a more centralized, efficient structure for launching attacks. 26% of the world's bot-infected computers were in China, a higher percentage than any other country.
The report also found that fierce competition in the criminal underworld is driving down prices for stolen financial information. Criminals may purchase verified credit card numbers for as little as $1, and they can buy a complete identity - a date of birth and US bank account, credit card and government- issued identification numbers - for $14.
The report focused on attacks during the last half of 2006 on more than 120 million computers running Symantec antivirus software. The company operates more than 2 million decoy email accounts designed to attract messages from around the world to identify spam and phishing activity.
(news.myway.com 19MAR07)
Last Modified: Friday, 23-Mar-2007 18:13:54 EST