Hanoi Times - The Internet is now a primary conduit for attacks, overtaking general network attacks, and o­nline users are finding it increasingly easy to become victims when visiting everyday web sites, according to the latest report released by Symantec.

The US-based Internet security provider said that the report was derived from data collected by millions of Internet sensors, first-hand research and an active monitoring of hacker communications, and it provided a global view of the state of Internet security.

In the past, users had to visit intentionally malicious sites or click o­n insidious email attachments to become a victim of a security threat.

"Today, hackers are compromising legitimate web sites and using them as a distribution medium to attack home and enterprise computers," said Stephen Trilling, Symantec’s vice president of Security Technology and Response.

Trilling noticed that attackers were particularly targeting sites that were likely to be trusted by most users, such as social networking sites.

According to the report, attackers were leveraging site-specific vulnerabilities that could then be used as a means to launch other harmful attacks.

During the last six months of 2007, there were 11,253 site-specific and cross-site scripting vulnerabilities reported o­n the Internet.

However, o­nly 473 (about 4 per cent) of these had been patched by the administrator of the affected web site during the same period, representing an enormous window of opportunity for hackers wanting to launch attacks, the report said.

Phishing also continues to be a problem. In the last six months of 2007, Symantec observed 87,963 phishing hosts – computers that can host o­ne or more phishing web sites.

This was an increase of 167 per cent from the first half of 2007. Eighty per cent of the brands targeted by phishing attacks during the study period were in the financial sector.

The report also found that attackers were seeking confidential end-user information that could be fraudulently used for financial gain, and were less focused o­n the computer or device containing the information.

In the last six months of 2007, 68 per cent of the most prevalent malicious threats reported to Symantec attempted to compromise confidential information.

Finally, attackers are leveraging a maturing underground economy to buy, sell and trade stolen information. This economy is now characterized by several traits common in traditional economies.

For example, market forces of supply and demand have a direct impact o­n pricing. Credit card information, which has become plentiful in this environment, accounted for 13 per cent of all advertised underground goods–down from 22 per cent in the previous period and sold for as low as US$ 0.40.

The price of a credit card in this underground market is determined by factors such as the location of the issuing bank.

Credit cards from the European Union, for example, cost more than those from the US, which is most likely due to the smaller supply of cards circulating in the EU making them more valuable to a criminal.

Bank account credentials have become the most frequently advertised item, making up 22 per cent of all goods and selling for as little as $10, according to the report.