Pierluigi Paganini January 31, 2016

According to a new report from Panda Security more than 84 million new malware samples were detected over the 2015, 27% of all malware of ever.

In 2015, security experts have detected the a record number of new malware, according to a report published by Panda Security more than 84 million new malware samples were collected.

It is an impressive number considering that corresponds to the 27 percent of all malware ever created.

“Last year saw the greatest number of cyberattacks recorded around the world, with a total of 304 million samples, which means that more than a quarter of all malware samples ever recorded were produced in 2015 (27.63%).” states the report.

Giving a closing look at the report it is possible to note that Trojans are the main threats, they account for 51.45 percent, followed by viruses at 22.79 percent, worms at 13.22 percent, potentially unwanted programs such as adware at 10.71 percent and cases of spyware at 1.83 percent.

The spike in the number of threats despite the improvement of Antivirus solution is mainly caused by an intensification of the activities of malware authors. Threat actors are spreading more variations on the same strain of malware with the intent to avoid detection, an operation that benefits of the availability of automated software slightly modify the malicious code.

Fortunately, antivirus vendors are getting smarter improving detection mechanisms and a rapid information sharing that allows them to promptly respond to new threats.

Panda Security confirmed to have a dedicated infrastructure to share malicious code samples with other vendors.

Looking at the geography of the infections, China remains one of the most infected countries in the world (57.24%). The number of infections in China increased nearly 30% more than in 2014. Taiwan was the second with an infection rate of 49.15%, followed by Turkey (42.52%).

Enjoy the report!

Pierluigi Paganini

(Security Affairs – cybersecurity, Panda Security)