- In the 2nd half of 2013 the number of new malware programs increased by 24% to 1,874,141.
- Compared to 2012, the number of new malware strains rose by 28% in 2013. The 3,384,075 detected significantly exceeded the forecast milestone of 3 million. As an average over the year, 9,271 new malware types were identified every day.
- Adware is on the increase. It is not just the number of malware types that is increasing. Instances of individual adware families are also spreading fast and account for the Top 10 of most common malware types.
- Exploits are not very numerous. However they play a significant role in automated attacks.
- 99.9% of all malware runs under Windows. The proportion of .NET malware has increased to 5.2%.
- Malicious websites are only spread across marginally more categories than in the last half year (2.6%).
- New in the Top 10 of dangerous websites is the gambling category.
- Websites in the education category are no longer in the Top 10.
- The effect of a botnet server takedown initiated by Microsoft fizzled out quite quickly.
- The arrest of the developer of the Blackhole exploit kit had more effect, especially on the ZeuS clone Citadel.
- The Bebloh family of banking Trojans held onto its market share and actually increased it. The Bankpatch family is no longer a factor.
- Cridex (alias Feodo) achieved huge infection numbers via spam campaigns.
Forecasts and trends
- Once again, the number of malware categories will increase in the coming year. We expect that the milestone of 10,000 new malware types per day will be surpassed.
- Adware and encryption Trojans will increase.
- Hosting will continue to be carried out in high-tech countries.
- As a result of major sporting events, we expect that attacks on gambling and sport websites will occupy a greater share.
- Banking Trojans will become even more refined.
Further information and more details can be found in the G DATA Malware Report H2 2013.