By Steve Ragan Mar 15, 2007, 15:23 GMT
SiteAdvisor, a division of McAfee, recently published a paper on Malware, and trends with obscure and often remote domains. The study looked in to the risk associated with each of the two hundred sixty-five domains. The domains were country specific such as .jp for Japan, and generic such as .com or commercial.
The numbers and stats they show are somewhat well rounded, and points not to the country or nationality as the risk, but a trend that the most abused domains are the ones that are quick and easy to obtain. The testing was rounded and well developed too. One of the SiteAdvisor testing criteria tested websites “for excessive pop-ups, other fraudulent practices, and browser exploits. Browser exploits, also known as drive-by-downloads, enable Viruses or Spyware to install on a consumer's computer without their consent and often without their knowledge,” McAfee reports.
Romania (.ro, 5.6%) and Russia (.ru, 4.5%) are listed as the two domains that pose the most risk. These country TLDs (Top Level Domains) are also the most likely to host exploit sites. There is “.info” listed as the riskiest generic TLD, with seven and one half percent of its sites rated as risky. Coming in second is “.com,” with five and one half percent of sites rated as risky.
A stunning seventy-three percent of the more than six thousand “.info” sites that were tested for e-mail practices are rated risky. SiteAdvisor registrations at these sites resulted in the receipt of high volume e-mail, Spam like e-mail or both. Russia and South Korea trail the “.info” TLD with twenty-two percent and twenty percent, respectively.
You can read the entire report online at the SiteAdvisorwebsite.http://www.siteadvisor.com/studies/map_malweb_mar2007.html
Your Talkback on this Story