PandaLabs, the laboratory of Panda Security, both detected and neutralised more than 84 million new malware samples throughout 2015. This is 9 million more than the year previous, according to the corresponding data. The figure means that there were 230,000 new malware samples produced daily over the course of the year.
2015: greatest number of cyber attacks recorded around the world
Last year saw the greatest number of cyber attacks recorded around the world, with a total of 304 million samples, which means that more than a quarter of all malware samples ever recorded were produced in 2015 (27.63%).
It was also a difficult year for certain multinational companies who suffered large scale data theft and interference on their IT systems.
Cyber crime predicted to grow
“We predict that the amount of malware created by cybercriminals will continue to grow”, says Luis Corrons, Technical Director of PandaLabs, “we also can’t forget that the creation of millions of Trojans and other threats corresponds to the cybercriminals’ needs to infect as many users as possible in order to get more money”.
Biggest infections caused by Trojans
Among all types of malware that cause large infections worldwide, it was Trojans that had the greatest rate of infection (60.30%), albeit 5% down on the figure from 2014.
PUPs were also particularly harmful, with nearly a third of infections resorting to trick techniques to fully enter the targeted PCs, far ahead of Adware/Spyware (5.19%), worms (2.98%), and viruses (2.55%).
China’s highest rate of infected computers
Last year was notable for being the year with the highest rate of infections caused on computers. On a geographic level, China was the country with the most infected computers (57.24%), a figure that was nearly 30% more than in 2014. Taiwan was next, with an infection rate of 49.15%, followed by Turkey (42.52%). These three countries remain at the top of the infection rate rankings, just as they were in 2014 and 2013.
Other countries that registered an infection rate that was above the global average included Colombia (33.17%), Uruguay (32.98%), and Spain (32.15%).
Japan and Nordic countries register the lowest rate of infection
According to the information gathered regarding countries with the lowest rates of infection, nine of them were in Europe, with Japan being the only country not located in the continent.
The Nordic countries occupied the top positions: Finland was ahead of the rest, with a rate of 20.32%, followed by Norway (20.51%) and Sweden (20.88).
Edited from press release by Cecilia Rehn.
