RSSOne-Third of Computer Attacks Start in US
By Ed Oswald | Published March 19, 2007, 11:28 AM
Most computer attacks originate in the United States, a study has found. Additionally, hackers are increasingly becoming more organized, creating crime rings that are becoming more effective in carrying out attacks.
The report, released by Symantec on Monday, details increasingly sophisticated networks are causing an increase in data theft and leakage, as well as targeted code which is being used to steal confidential information and then sell it on the black market.
Competition in this underground industry is driving down prices of verified credit card at personal information. A criminal can purchase a credit card with verification number for between $1 and $6 USD, while a full identity could be had for as little as $14.
A common misconception is that the attackers are usually based overseas or outside of the US. Symantec disputes this belief in its report, saying 31 percent of the malicious activity came from within US borders, the highest of any country.
Second was China, at 10 percent, and Germany came in third, comprising 7 percent of attacks.
"As cyber criminals become increasingly malicious, they continue to evolve their attack methods to become more complex and sophisticated in order to prevent detection," Symantec security response and managed services senior vice president Arthur Wong said.
Other findings included a rise in both spam and online fraud schemes. 59 percent of all e-mail traffic during the second half of 2006 was spam, and 166,248 unique phishing messages were detected, both increases over the prior period.
31 percent from US borders - China 10 percent - Germany 7 percent.
So where is the other 52 percent comming from ?
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|For those curious:
http://eval.symantec.com...rt_xi_03_2007.en-us.pdf
Actually, skimming it was quite an interesting read, apparently Beijing has 5% of the world bot-infect computers, and the US has 40% of the bot "command and control" computers.
(page 25 of 104)
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|Interesting. So they did track the zombies, and not the originator of those zombies.
...which basically makes the headline BS. The attacks start with the guy who wrote the virus, trojan, or whatever created the zombie system.
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|Well, it sounds a little more like they counted the zombie managers, which is still not really the originator, but at least they didn't count the grunt zombies.
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|"One-Third of Computer Attacks Start in US
[...]
Most computer attacks originate in the United States, a study has found. "
When did "one-third" get to be "most"? It's bad enough, for sure, but isn't that description a little sensational, given the numbers you quoted?
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|I think the word "most" meant "the largest single group."
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|It would be interesting to see what data they used for this report.
For example, if they simply counted the number of "zombie" systems, the machines that actually carry out the dirty work, of course they'd be mostly in the US. This would absolutely fail to account for the people who are controlling them.
If they counted only servers that had malicious code for phishing and such, again, the US would "win" (Tripod, lycos, geocities, AOL, etc...all have more US users than any other country).
It'd be really nice to know what they were using to determine where the attacks started (The zombies, websites, or the guy who created them).
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|What do you mean by "of course they'd be mostly in the US"?
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|lmao..
I knew someone would try to turn this into an "Our Country vs. Yours" debate.
Sorry, not interested.
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|What do you mean by "of course they'd be mostly in the US"?
I think he means that most pc users in the US do not have the vast IT knowledge that most people reading these forums have(they just turn the thing on and it works)
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