Workers blamed for virus epidemics
5 August 2004
Staff are being blamed for the spread of computer viruses and other computer security problems, a new survey claims.
Research conducted by anti-virus firm McAfee found that 50 per cent of senior managers in small businesses blame staff for damage caused by computer viruses. Just over half of the small firms questioned said they had suffered damage due to a virus outbreak and McAfee found that staff downloaded unsafe programs on to work PCs and disabled security systems designed to protect them.
Sal Viveros, spokesman for McAfee which commissioned the research, said: "Businesses can have the most robust and integrated security system in the world, but one rogue end user could still be responsible for introducing malicious code onto the network with potentially serious consequences."
The survey also found that anti-virus software was widely used on desktop machines (92 per cent), servers (83 per cent) and network gateways (65 per cent), and firewalls (89 per cent) in small firms.
According to McAfee, mass mailers are still responsible for most computer viruses, while Potentially Unwanted Programs (PUPs) like spyware/adware and malware-related threats delivered by spam now account for 60 per cent of all malicious threats tracked.
Overall, computer virus attacks reaching a Medium risk assessment or higher have dramatically increased in the first half of 2004, compared to all of last year. McAfee believes phishing schemes will continue to increase throughout the remainder of 2004 due to general lack of consumer awareness.
"The rise in viruses, worms, Trojans and unwanted programs such as spyware, hacking tools and password stealers in the first half of 2004 has already surpassed what we saw throughout all of 2003, bringing us very close to the 100 thousandth mark for identified threats," said Vincent Gullotto, vice president of McAfee AVERT.
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