The Hindu News Update Service
News Update Service
Tuesday, May 5, 2009 : 0345 Hrs
Sci. & Tech.
Web-based malicious attacks on rise in India: study
Bangalore (IANS): India remains a soft target for Internet threats, as evident
from the steep rise in malicious attacks from web-based sources originating
mostly from the US and China, a study by global security solutions provider
Symantec has revealed.
"Computers in India are set to witness increased malicious activities due to
rapid growth of Internet infrastructure, a burgeoning broadband population
and rampant software piracy," Symantec India managing director Vishal Dhupar
said.
According to the Symentac Internet Security Threat report, which is based on
data pooled by Internet sensors, first-hand research and monitoring of hacking
communications during January-December 2008, computers from the US and China
were the leading source of web-based attacks targeting India.
Web surfing remained the primary source of new infections in 2008. Attackers
rely on customised malicious code toolkits to develop and distribute their
threats, targeting confidential information of computer users.
"Unless enterprises improve security protocols and measures to counter
malicious activities, India will continue to be a soft target of Internet
threats,"
Mr. Dhupar said.
The report noted that India ranked among the top three countries in the
Asia-Pacific-Japan (APJ) region that was subjected to malicious code activity by
volume as the country had the fifth highest number of broadband subscribers
(eight million) in the region.
Malicious code is a new breed of Internet threat that cannot be efficiently
controlled by conventional anti-virus software. The code can enter network
drives
and spread. It can cause network and mail server overload by sending e-mail
messages, stealing data and passwords, deleting document files, e-mail files
or passwords and even re-formatting hard drives.
Internet users in India also faced a serious threat from worms and viruses
attacks. In the APJ region, India ranked first with nine of the top 10 malicious
codes found consisting 55 percent worms and 15 percent viruses. These infesting
codes disabled security related processes and stole confidential information.
In the global context, the study found India ranked high on these vectors of
infection, as evident from the damage the Downadup/Conficker worm caused to
thousands of computers across the country during the initial stages of attack.
"Enterprises without protective strategies are likely to see worms and viruses
infiltrate their environments and access their information and infrastructure.
Indian enterprises have to adopt ingress and egress filtering on perimeter
devices to prevent unwanted activity," said Dhupar.
Around 65 percent of worms and viruses in Indian enterprises are propagated
through the file sharing/executables mechanism.
"This indicates that endpoint security and policy are still missing in many
organisations as this level of security protection would have allowed IT
administrators
to scan removable drives for threats. A large number of infections in India
have also occurred due to file-sharing programmes, free downloads and freeware
and shareware versions of software," Dhupar noted.
Similarly, with an average of 836 bot attacks per day, the study found 103,812
computers were infected in the country during 2008.
Bot (short form for robot) is a malicious code (computer programme) that comes
with an e-mail attachment sent to intended users by hackers for infecting
and damaging their personal computers or servers in enterprises.
When a spam mail is opened, the user is enticed to click the attachment with
tempting words for viewing the link. Unknowingly, the bot in the link attacks
the computer when opened.
According to the report, India had an average of 836 bots per day during 2008
and there were 103,812 distinct bot-infected computers observed in the country
during the period.
India also saw a huge surge in bot command and control servers to 70 in 2008
from 40 in 2007.
Bot command-and-control servers are computers that botnet owners use to relay
commands to bot-infected computers on their networks.
The sharp increase in bot-infected computers in India pointed towards low
adoption of security measure that includes anti-malware, intrusion prevention
and intrusion detection.
Among cities with the highest number of bot-infected computers, Mumbai topped
with 37 percent followed by Chennai at 24 percent and Delhi seven percent.
The report is compiled by the Symantec security technology and response
organisation, which includes security response, a worldwide team of security
engineers,
threat analysts, and researchers.
With global response centres located the world over, the organisation monitors
malicious code reports from 130 million systems across the Internet, receives
data from 240,000 network sensors in 200 countries and tracks 32,000
vulnerabilities.
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