sophos

Leading security firm Sophos has revealed that Google's Android operating system (OS) -- and not Microsoft's Windows -- is now the favorite operating system for hackers to target. Sophos revealed that finding in its newly released 2013 Security ... Threat Report. The firm says that during a three-month time frame, one in every ten Android-based devices was the target of some kind of malware attack. By comparison, only six per cent of Windows devices were targeted by hackers and other purveyors of malware. (Source: forbes.com ) This is the first time since the 1990s that Windows has not been the ... (view more)

Prominent security firm Sophos has discovered that approximately one out of every five Mac computers is infected with Windows malware. And while such infections pose little threat to the Macs themselves, they could spread to Windows computers. The ... report is the result of Sophos' work in analyzing the contents of about 100,000 Apple Macintosh computers, using the company's own anti-virus software for the Mac world. The analysis shows that 20 per cent of the computers are carrying some kind of Windows-oriented malware. About 2.7 per cent of the Mac computers, or about one in thirty-seven of the ... (view more)

Online swindlers are hoping to cash-in from Facebook's recent integration with Skype by spamming those looking to use their social networking platform as a means to conduct video calling. Cyber scumbags are not only targeting individual users on ... Facebook, but all of their 'friends' as well. According to a report posted on Sophos' Naked Security blog, the latest scam makes the video chat feature appear as a safe application (called "video call") and comes in the form of a Facebook wall post, enticing users to click onto a link dubbed "enable video calls". As Sophos states, the format of the ... (view more)

Think Macs can't be infected by viruses? Think again. While Apple computers are generally less likely to be attacked by hackers, it's not impossible to infect a Mac with malware (or virus). For years Apple has boasted that its computers are more ... secure than PCs. And they were right -- but that was based on a technicality that only a tiny fraction of the population owned Macs, and thus, there was less profit to be made and less havoc to wreak for hackers. But that's starting to change as the number of Mac owners increases, making for an awkward situation at Apple headquarters in Cupertino, ... (view more)

Amidst reports that threats to Macs are steadily increasing , security firm Sophos is now offering a free version of its business antivirus software to Apple computer fans. It's a pretty good deal: dubbed Sophos Anti-Virus Home Edition for Mac, the ... software comes with no strings attached and will be updated forever (or the foreseeable future). The Sophos software has been adapted from its business roots so that it is easier to install and operate. (Source: zdnet.co.uk ) According to Chris Kraft, Sophos product management vice president, the Mac offering is the exact same model currently being ... (view more)

A recent report suggests that most users that use social networking sites have reported being spammed, with more than a third of those messages containing malicious links, or malware attached to the bogus messages. The security firm which ran the ... survey says the issue could be a serious threat to corporate networks. According to security experts Sophos, 57% of those questioned say they received unsolicited messages on their social networks last year, compared with 33% in 2008. The proportion who received either infected files or links to harmful material rose from 21% to 36%. Businesses Aware ... (view more)

And now for a report that is sure to surprise no one but stimulate many: Facebook users expose themselves to identity theft and virus attacks. Wagging their fingers on this one is Sophos, a well-known web security company based in Boston, MA. Sophos ... has even gone so far as to set up their own fake account, in order to develop some interesting insights on the Facebook phenomenon. Although still trailing long-time society site MySpace, Facebook is one of the fastest-growing pages on the 'net. It allows a user to create his or her own mini-site, invite chums to become their online "friends" (it ... (view more)

Web security gurus from Sophos have found another reason to keep your zipper up and belt firmly buckled. As if it weren't already good practice to avoid nudies on the Internet, a new Trojan horse is teasing web users with explicit images and videos. ... The problems have arisen via emails. No surprise there. Although the folks at Sophos (and Infopackets, too) are still finding it hard to believe that people could be duped into something so blatantly laced with threats, there are those out there who are clicking. (source: hackinthebox.org ) What happens to those individuals is not quite as ... (view more)

It has been a controversial week for the free web encyclopedia known as Wikipedia. First, it was hit with a plagiarism scandal . Now, the website is under fire again because shady hackers have used it to distribute a virus. A page was created on the ... German version of Wikipedia warning users about a new variant of the Blaster worm. The article included a link to download a virus remover. Unfortunately for unsuspecting users, what they ended up downloading was the virus itself. (Source: Internetnews.com ) Anti-virus company Sophos posted this on its website: "Wikipedia allows anyone to create ... (view more)

Sophos Anti-Rootkit What is a rootkit? The term rootkit is used to define a Trojan (or technology) used to hide the presence of a malicious object (process, file, registry key, network port) from the computer user or administrator. Sophos ... Anti-Rootkit helps to eliminate hidden applications and processes. Removing rootkits without compromising system integrity is particularly challenging and needs to be done with care. Our free software, Sophos Anti-Rootkit, finds and removes any rootkit that is hidden on your computer. http://www.sophos.com Pdf24 Create PDF-documents from any application, ... (view more)