Matthew Hines

While researchers have long predicted an impending onslaught of malware programs designed to attack mobile devices, examples of such programs observed in the wild have proven rather few and far between. There have been some notable instances of the attacks, such as with the Cabir Bluetooth-borne worm virus that targets Symbian smartphones, but for the […]

There’s more evidence suggesting that major botnets are feeling a serious pinch in the wake of the takedown of notorious hosting provider McColo last week. Anti-botnet specialist FireEye reported earlier this week that it had observed over 450,000 stranded bots fruitlessly attempting to connect back to command and control servers that had been swept offline […]

Desktop anti-virus and management applications provider PC Tools, acquired by Symantec in August, is predicting that Nov. 24 will repeat as the annual high-water mark for overall malware threat volume. PC Tools and other security researchers bestowed the title of “Black Monday” on the date in 2007 when nefarious cyber-activity peaked on the Monday before […]

Security researchers are starting to hammer home the idea that the current economic climate is resulting in higher volumes of malware and phishing attacks. As threats have continued to increase in overall numbers at a fairly consistent rate for many years now, I’m still not quite sold on the whole concept, but it is an […]

Researchers are finding hundreds of thousands of stranded bots hopelessly attempting to connect to command and control centers that were taken offline when shady hosting provider McColo was cut off by its own hosts last week. After Washington Post blogger Brian Krebs and a team of other interested parties, including researchers at FireEye, worked to […]

Web-based malware attacks are increasingly being targeted at specific vertical markets, security researchers contend, with certain sectors finding themselves in the crosshairs far more frequently these days and a growth in the volume of threats being aimed at many industries now drastically outpacing attacks on the long-beleaguered financial services segment. According to a recent report […]

Cisco published the final installment of its comprehensive study into data leakage trends last week, with the latest results highlighting the continued contribution of insider activity to the overall problem of electronic information loss. According to the report, based on a survey of 10,000-plus workers worldwide conducted for Cisco by pollsters InsightExpress, both malicious and […]

Malicious attacks carried out directly against networking infrastructure have taken off in nearly every sense over the last year, according to the latest report issued by researchers at backbone security specialist Arbor Networks. The company, which markets threat monitoring technology and services to large network operators and infrastructure providers including ISPs, contends that attacks have […]

I don’t tend to cover much vendor activity here in the blog, but an interesting new anti-malware applications provider officially brought its initial product to market this week, and it does seem worthy of a mention. NovaShield, which is pitching a new brand of behavioral analysis technology to help solve issues with today’s cutting-edge malware […]

Add MX Logic to the growing list of messaging security specialists charting a noticeable downturn in the overall level of spam e-mail that they’re processing via their customers’ networks each month. Following several other similar reports that have pinpointed minor downturns in the sheer volume of unsolicited e-mail finding its way into people’s in-boxes, at […]

I had the opportunity to spend some time last week with Tom Kellermann, a member of the Commission on Cyber Security for the 44th Presidency and a colleague of mine at my full-time employer. In a series of interviews with members of the print media about President-elect Obama’s potential policies around cyber-security, Tom repeatedly brought […]

According to Sunbelt Software’s monthly listing of the most ubiquitous malware and spyware attacks, an entirely new family of threats emerged rapidly during October. Based on the company’s research, which is aggregated using data filtered by its AV and anti-spyware technologies, Sunbelt’s report of the top ten most prevalent attacks during the month includes INF.Autorun […]