Report: Mobile Malware Climbs 600%

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Two separate security reports today are out today, drawing attention to potential threats against enterprise systems. Juniper Networks had found a surge in mobile malware, primarily targeting Android devices. And Google added new malware statistics to its transparency report, as well as noting that hacked websites present a significant danger.

All Things D’s Arik Hesseldahl reported, “Careful what you install on your smartphone. The number of malware programs masquerading as legitimate mobile apps grew by more than 600 percent in 2012, according to a new survey by the networking company Juniper. Juniper’s third annual report on the state of mobile security is out today. It says the firm detected a total of 276,259 mobile malware apps, up from 28,500 in 2011 and only 11,000 in 2010.”

Computerworld’s Lucian Constantin noted, “Over three quarters of Android threats are malicious apps that send SMS messages to premium rate numbers and could be mitigated by a protection feature present in Android 4.2, according to researchers from networking vendor Juniper Networks. However, because manufacturers and carriers fail to update Android end user devices in a timely fashion, only 4 percent of devices currently run Android 4.2, even though this version was released more than six months ago.”

In separate news, Nicole Perlroth with The New York Times wrote, “Google said on Monday it would also be expanding its transparency report to include new numbers around malware and phishing attacks on the Internet. In 2006, Google started searching for, and flagging, suspect Web sites for its users. It is now flagging some 10,000 sites a day”

CNET’s Seth Rosenblatt added, “Web sites you think are safe but have been compromised to distribute malicious software are far more prevalent than sites that are intentionally dangerous, according to a new Transparency Report from Google released on Tuesday…. During the week of June 9, Google tallied 39,247 hacked sites.”