Cybercriminals kicked off 2011 with a bang, with the first quarter of 2011 resulting in the most active first quarter in malware history. According to McAfee’s Q1 Threats Report, released today, while malware soared, spam took a huge dip, due in part to the biggest botnet takedown in history.

Canadian consumers are definitely concerned about the problem of increasing malware when surfing the Web today. According to May 2011 statistics from Leger Marketing, only 21.6 per cent of Canadians believe they are protected from today’s malware threats, such as increased activity in the number of domains, IP addresses and URLs with malicious
reputations.

McAfee’s Q1 2011 Threats Report highlights the newest threats attacking various platforms, as well as the most popular malware and spam trends, both globally and regionally.

Specifically, the report findings reveal that:

• There were six million unique samples of recorded malware, the most active first quarter in malware history
• Spam is at its lowest levels since 2007, due in part from the Rustock botnet takedown
• Symbian and Android environments are the most popular for mobile malware
• Spam promoting products was the most popular lure in most global regions

PRESS RELEASE

McAfee Q1 Threats Report Reveals Surge in Malware and Drop in Spam

Symbian and Android the most popular mobile malware environments; Spam dips due to Rustock takedown

SANTA CLARA, Calif. – June 1, 2011 – McAfee today released the McAfee Threats Report: First Quarter 2011. With six million unique samples of recorded malware, Q1 2011 was the most active first quarter in malware history. The report revealed many of the trends that had a significant impact on the threat landscape, such as the takedown of the Rustock botnet, which resulted in spam remaining at its lowest levels since 2007, and confirmed that mobile malware is the new frontier of cybercrime.

“The Q1 Threats Report indicates that it’s been a busy start to
2011 for cybercriminals,” said Vincent Weafer, senior vice president of McAfee Labs. “Even though this past quarter once again showed that spam has slowed, it doesn’t mean that cybercriminals aren’t actively pursuing alternate avenues. We’re seeing a lot of emerging threats, such as Android malware and new botnets attempting to take over where Rustock left off, that will have a significant impact on the activity we see quarter after quarter.”

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This is a study that I believe will interest everyone: a team of computer scientists at two University of California campuses have identified what they call the “choke point” that, if applied, will greatly reduce the flow of spam — or even stop it.

For 3 months, they set out to purposefully receive all the spam they could, even bought items from the merchants advertised and identified that 95% of the credit-card transactions worldwide were handled by… 3 financial companies. If the 3 financial companies stopped processing the spammers, they’re toast.

If a handful of companies like these refused to authorize online credit card payments to the merchants, “you’d cut off the money that supports the entire spam enterprise,” said one of the scientists, Stefan Savage of the University of California, San Diego, who worked with colleagues at San Diego and Berkeley and at the International Computer Science Institute.

Though most banks already refuse to work with shady merchants, not all financial companies are willing to cooperate to stop the flow of spam. Interestingly, when asked, Visa, the largest credit card company, declined to comment.

You can download the study here [pdf].

Read more about this revealing study at: nytimes.

Apologies to all who received spam from “rachelle” purporting to be from Photoxels. We hate spammers (and their spam) as much as you do. We have removed all cgi scripts from the site so this type of spamming should not happen again (fingers crossed).