Microsoft Security Intelligence Report (January – June 2007) is Now Available

The new Security Intelligence Report (SIR) is out from the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) – the folks who make Forefront’s anti-malware engine. Vinnie Gullotto writes on the MMPC blog:

The SIR shares the conclusions drawn by our research team using data gathered from the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT), Windows Defender, Windows Live OneCare, Windows Live OneCare safety scanner, Exchange Hosted Services, and Forefront Client Security (FCS). The net of this, is threat related data from several hundred million Windows based systems.

From the data in the SIR we can see that the trends continue in a direction that indicates attackers are financially motivated and are adjusting their tactics along with constantly modifying the threats, both malicious and potentially unwanted (you can read more about what distinguishes each of these in the report) they use to support this goal. Some examples of findings in the new SIR:

· Significant increases in categories, such as Trojan downloaders, potentially unwanted software (which includes rogue security software), and exploits, suggest that distribution of potentially unwanted software is less and less a matter of a normal affiliate model and more often malicious and/or criminal in method and intent.

· We found 65% less Potentially Unwanted Software and 60% less malware on computers running Windows Vista than on computers running Windows XP SP2.

There’s more on the MMPC blog.
You can read the SIR at www.microsoft.com/sir