Smartphones are getting very popular and with its advantages, there are some disadvantages also. These devices are vulnerable to cyber threats. Antivirus makers are speculating that smartphones will contribute to the spread of viruses in 2011. Keeping these threats in mind, one of the antivirus companies, Trend Micro, said cyber crimes will increase as smartphones become more widespread in 2011. They also mentioned that mainly Windows XP and Windows 2000 users will be more vulnerable to these threats.
Trend Micro conducted a research and officials said that a new cyber threat is created every 1.5 seconds. It’s very threatening because the cyber crime world has already registered a higher turnover than drug traffickers. At a press conference, Trend Micro Turkey General Manager said that 2010 was a preparation and restructuring year for them, but despite that, the company registered a 55 percent growth in turnover. Trend Micro targets 50 percent growth in 2011. He also mentioned that with the diversification of operating systems together with the increase in mobile device use, 2011 seems to be a very fruitful year for cyber criminals. He added that cyber criminals would add a new chain to social engineering with malware attacks and e-mails carrying malware they developed.
During the research Trend Micro also found that 80 percent of malware attacks with the highest rates of circulation reached user systems via the web and the number of attacks is surely going to increase in 2011. Trend Micro executives predicted that cloud security needs to be tightened in 2011 as it will receive more advanced attacks.
Trend Micro research evaluated both the public sector and private sector individually and the research revealed that private sector is slightly better than the public sector in terms of cyber, crimes but private sector is suffering from serious threats.
