360,000 new malicious files detected globally everyday, up by 5.2pc: Kaspersky
Published on: Wednesday, December 16, 2020
By: Bernama
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Photo: kaspersky.com
In a statement today, the company said the percentage of Trojans -- malicious files capable of a range of actions -- detected increased by 40.5 per cent compared to the previous year, while 60.2 per cent of those files were non-specific Trojans.
“The vast majority of malicious files (89.80 per cent) were detected to have occurred via Windows PE files, a file format specific to Windows operating systems,” the global cybersecurity company said.
Nevertheless, it said the number of new malware related to Android operating systems declined by 13.7 per cent.
Kaspersky said attackers appear to have shifted their focus to computers and laptops as many people were working and studying from home.
Meanwhile, there had been an increase of 27 per cent in the number of different scripts, sent via malicious email campaigns or encountered on infected websites, which could reflect the fact that people spent more time on Internet and attackers attempted to capitalise on it.
Kaspersky security expert Denis Staforkin said the noticeable increase for this year would likely continue in 2021 as employees continue to work from home and countries implement different restrictions.
“However, if users take basic security precautions, they can significantly lower their risk of encountering them,” he said.
Among the precautions are using a robust security solution appropriate for systems and devices, ignore messages requesting to disable security systems for office or antivirus software, and creating strong and unique passwords.
