Every Month is Trojan Month

BitDefender released today the list of the top ten e-threats detected during the month of September current and once again, five of the ten e- threats listed are Trojans.

The top opens with Trojan.Skintrim.HTML.A, type of HTML page usually found associated with adware programs such as Navipromo, at number ten.

Two threats using the Autorun security loophole in older versions of Windows occupy the following two positions. Interestingly enough, the lower-spreading one of them is actually a downloader component used to spread the well-known Conficker or Kido worm (aka Downadup).

A long-time veteran of BitDefender's top ten, Win32.Sality.OG dropped from fifth to seventh place this month. This encrypted, polymorphic file infector seems set for a very long cybercrime "career".

At number 6, Trojan.Exploit.JS.Y is a malicious bit of javascript, usually found on compromised or malicious websites.

Another exploit, this time using a vulnerability in the way some versions of the Adobe PDF reader parse embedded javascript is gaining popularity again and can be found at number 5 in the top.

Conficker, in its various guises, is detected by BitDefender as Win32.Worm.Downadup.Gen and occupies the fourth spot, with a sizeable 5.5% of the total number of infected files detected during the month.

Finally, the top three is covered by a malware trifecta which should already be familiar to those following developments in the malware world: the Wimad trojan, a generic detection for Autorun-using trojans and the Clicker adware trojan are again the most prevalent threats, accounting between them for no less than 25% of all infections found.

Of these, Trojan.Clicker is the most widespread threat on the Web at the moment, possibly due to its regained popularity as an infection tool of choice among malicious purveyors of "warez" (cracks, key generators or keys for popular software).