[photopress:it_computer_virus.jpg,full,alignright]According to a security report by Symantec the amount of new malicious software identified increased by 468% last year.
Before we go any further let us remember that Symantec sells anti-virus software — Norton is a major brand but is not consider the category leader in efficiency — and every year it sends out some pretty alarming press material. In its report it said ‘the number of computer viruses in circulation has reached one million for the first time.’
Symantec said that just over 711,000 new viruses were identified in the past year – an increase of 468% on the number identified in the previous year.
So what is a new virus? Typically it is a standard virus where some idiot hacker has changed to lines of code, added a new name and bought some transitory bragging rights.
According to Symantex the US was still by far the greatest contributor to the pool of malicious software infecting the world’s computers, accounting for 24% of such activity.
China is now the second-ranked country — behind the US — for hosting phishing websites, accounting for 4% of the total, compared with 1% in the previous period, when it was ranked 18th.
Any half way sensible user can avoid all this nonsense by using one of two free programs. Either AVG or Avast! We run three computers in this office pretty much non-stop and we have not had a virus infection in three years. Note we did not use the Symantec product, Norton. (And I knew Peter Norton quite well and he used to send me Christmas cards but that does not change my opinion of the effectiveness of the product.)
There plainly is an increase in virus activity in China and that is probably because of the amount of illegally copied software. But banning viruses from a computer is very easy, quick to do and pretty well totally fail-safe. Press releases by commercially interested parties like Symantec are interesting but do not help.
Source: Times Online