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88% Of IM Worms Mutated In Last 11 Months
John Stith
Staff Writer
2005-11-15
 Insider Reports RSS Feed
Instant messaging is a fast growing shipping line for worms. IMlogic said in their recent study that over 88% of the worms they tracked mutated at least once. IMlogic believes the speed of these mutations poses a legitimate threat for both home user and corporate instant messaging.
As a leading indicator for the number of mutations to expect, the Kelvir worm has mutated 123 times during the last 11 months. Most disturbing, with the latest mutation trend, is the breadth of threats which have mutated; more than 88 percent of all IM worms tracked by the IMlogic Threat Center have demonstrated mutations. In addition, traditional email worms have begun spreading through IM.
For example the email Rbot worm which has mutated over 600 times since first being discovered in email, now has over 13 mutations using IM for distribution. The combination of IM threats mutating to avoid existing virus protection, the increasing sophistication of IM viruses and the mutations of threats across distribution modes has created IM threats that are more capable of installing malware on the local machine, disabling existing desktop security software and antivirus systems, and capturing sensitive end-user information
The IMlogic Threat Center released the following statistics highlighting the increasing threat level posed by rapidly mutating IM worms:
-- 88 percent of all worms tracked by the IMlogic Threat Center have demonstrated mutations
-- Kelvir is leading with 41 percent of mutations, followed by Bropia with 10 percent and Opanki with eight percent in the category of worms that are delivered only by IM
-- The number of blended threats using the public IM networks for distribution is increasing, with over 26 new IM-based mutations appearing in the top three traditionally email distributed worm groups of Rbot, Sdbot, and Mytob.In 2005, 62 percent of mutating IM threats targeted the MSN network via Windows Messenger or MSN Messenger, 25 percent targeted AOL, and eight percent targeted the Yahoo! instant messaging network;
-- During the month of October, more than 70 percent of worms identified delivered malware capable of disabling existing desktop security software and undermined traditional anti-virus detection and protection capabilities.
"The rapid mutation of real-time security attacks over IM networks poses a unique challenge for enterprises," said IMlogic Chief Technology Officer Jon Sakoda. "Reactive measures are increasingly inadequate at protecting organizations from these mutating threats. A more proactive and predictive approach for securing IM and real-time applications is now required for comprehensive security."
About the Author:
John is a staff writer for SecurityProNews covering cyber security.
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