Computer virus attacks like "spy-phishing" are expected to be on the rise this year, making them a "predominant concern" for individual companies, according to a report by a leading computer security concern.
The 2005 Annual Round-Up and 2006 Forecast by Trend Micro said, in 2005, the vast majority of threats were inspired by financial gains "rather than notoriety". More targeted attacks focussed on "certain company and their users" or on a particular group with a "common connection".
Spy-phising, a new kind of attack witnessed last year dealt with "the de facto usage of blended threats" motivated by financial gains.
Attackers looked for other stealth methods and had found a more effective tool of them all called "rootkits". Towards end of 2005, rootkits were being used as the ultimate weapon to assist cloaking "malware and grayware" activity. Rootkits modify the operating system behaviour to hide certain processes, files, folders and registry entries.
"Botworms", a special type of "hybrid threat", have been fast spreading "primarily due to the fact that they have become open sources developments, built in a modular fashion".
The report said 2005 could be referred to as the "year of grayware", with 65 per cent of the top 15 threats (against software and hardware) accounting for nearly 11 million.
{{/usCountry}}The report said 2005 could be referred to as the "year of grayware", with 65 per cent of the top 15 threats (against software and hardware) accounting for nearly 11 million.
{{/usCountry}}The Trend Micro report expected rootkits coupled with threats like "spear-phising" to continue this year and become a "primary concern" for individual companies.
However, "we expect to see detection numbers increase this year for new variants," the report added.