Cisco: Cybercriminals Hiding Behind Legitimate Websites, Email Accounts

It’s getting harder to tell the good guys from the bad: Sophisticated cybercriminals are increasingly taking cover behind legitimate Websites and email domains to lure their victims, according to Cisco Systems’ annual security report, released today.Among the key findings of The 2008 Cisco Annual Security Report is a 90 percent increase this year in threats originating on legitimate Websites that were unknowingly infected by cybercriminals. And nearly 8 percent of email providers’ traffic was generated from hijacked legitimate email domains.
http://www.darkreading.com/security/vulnerabilities/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212500417Cisco Report Spotlights Worldwide Cyber Security Threats [news release]
2008 Edition Warns of More Sophisticated, Targeted Internet Attacks From an Increasingly Savvy Online Criminal EconomyCisco today released a security report that warns that Internet-based attacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated and specialized as profit-driven criminals continue to hone their approach to stealing data from businesses, employees and consumers. In the 2008 edition of the Cisco® Annual Security Report, the company identifies the year’s top security threats and offers recommendations for protecting networks against attacks that are propagating more rapidly, becoming increasingly difficult to detect, and exploiting technological and human vulnerabilities.”Every year we see threats evolve as criminals discover new ways to exploit people, networks and the Internet. This year’s trends underscore how important it is to look at all basic elements of security policies and technologies,” said Patrick Peterson, Cisco fellow and chief security researcher. “Organizations can lower their risk of data loss by fine-tuning access controls and patching known vulnerabilities to eliminate the ability for criminals to exploit holes in infrastructures. It is important to upgrade applications, endpoint systems and networking equipment to help ensure that corporate systems run smoothly and minimize risk.”
http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2008/prod_121508.html90 per cent of email is spam [AFP]
About 90 per cent of all email sent worldwide is spam, according to a Cisco report released today.The report, from computer networking company Cisco, says that accounts for nearly 200 billion messages daily.
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24808797-5005961,00.htmlAbout 90 percent of all email is spam: Cisco [AFP]
Armies of hijacked computers are flooding the world with spam as hackers devise slicker ways to take over unwitting people’s machines, according to a Cisco report.Virus-infected computers are woven into “botnets” used to attack more machines and to send specious sales pitches to email addresses in low-cost quests to bilk readers out of cash.
http://www.todayonline.com/articles/292788.asp