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Source: Security Park - Posted by Pax Dickinson
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In the ethereal world of the Internet, an underground crime war is being silently waged between the cyber-criminals and those trying to stop them. A war that is undermining the interests of corporations and governments worldwide and one that bears no regard for innocent victims. In fact, the victims are purposely targeted, unwittingly press-ganged into becoming foot-soldiers helping to spread spam, attack large companies and unknowingly distribute illegal porn and copyrighted materials. Nowadays, cyber-attacks and automated hacking tools work so fast and efficiently that the enemy is winning. Something needs to be done, as Nick Ray, CEO of Prevx explains.
A few years ago, cybercrime was the preserve of small groups of disaffected teenagers looking to infiltrate large organizations to highlight loopholes in IT policy, or at worst to vandalize websites. Sadly, such seemingly innocent motives are now a thing of the past, as hackers and writers of malicious programs have fallen into the employ of a dangerous master, the organized criminal. The script kiddy has grown up and he wants more than just pocket money.
In certain countries such as Brazil and the old Eastern Bloc countries, where laws governing cybercrime are non-existent, organized syndicates funded by cybercrime are booming. These countries have an abundance of skilled IT workers and programmers and, in this case, crime pays very well. Criminals are earning millions by covertly installing Trojans and spyware onto the home PCs of unsuspecting home users, stealing bank and credit card details and even entire identities. This is not only theft on a personal level but also stretches to global scale extortion, as illegal porn, music and software are distributed from company servers. Even websites are held to ransom. More than 90 per-cent of malicious code circulating on the Internet is now for personal gain. And they are gaining. Estimates put the cost of Internet crime at somewhere around £200 billion worldwide at the end of 2004.
Read this full article at Security Park
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