Viruses, Phishing and Trojans for Profit

From SecurityFocus.

Following the 2006 International Virus Bulletin Conference, Kelly Martin takes a look at the profit motives of the cyber criminals behind modern viruses, targeted trojans, phishing scams and botnet attacks that are stealing millions from organizations and individuals.

Virus Bulletin 2006, the international virus conference, was held in Montreal this year. Just a few weeks ago I was fortunate enough to attend many of the presentations, which ranged from topics of targeted trojan attacks, botnets and new methods of botnet coordination, to the growing criminal element behind viruses. It’s sometimes shocking to see how much the virus world has changed in the last few years. I’d wager that if there was just one overall theme of the conference, it was about criminals and the new profit motive behind today’s malware. Long gone are the days when viruses were made by hackers just for fun.

I found it all quite shocking, to be honest - I did not know how far these trojan toolkits have come, or how much it can lower the bar. One of the greatest security fears of any organization is (or should be) targeted trojans, because of their capability to steal virtually any information inside an organization and remain undetected for some time.
Kelly Martin

Read the full article at Security Focus.