Spyware Poses a Significant Threat on The Net
Spyware is alive and well on the Internet. That's the overall message of a new study by University of Washington computer scientists who sampled more than 20 million Internet addresses, looking for the programs that covertly enter the computers of unwitting Web surfers to perform tasks ranging from advertising products to gathering personal information, redirecting Web browsers, or even using a victim's modem to call expensive toll numbers.
They examined sites in a set of popular Web categories, such as game sites, news sites and celebrity-oriented sites. Within these, they found that:
- More than one in 20 executable files contained piggybacked spyware.
- On average, one in 62 Internet domains performed drive-by download attacks – a method for forcing spyware on users who simply visit a Web site.
- Game and celebrity Web sites appeared to pose the greatest risk for piggybacked spyware, while sites that offer pirated software topped the list for drive-by attacks.
- The density of spyware seemed to drop from spring to fall of last year, but remained "substantial."
The research is being presented today as the opening paper for the 13th Annual Network and Distributed System Security Symposium in San Diego, Calif.
posted by Fergie @ 2/03/2006 10:55:00 AM
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