[ISN] Korea Goes From Computer Security Threat to Victim

[InfoSec News]

http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200603/200603070011.html

Mar. 7, 2006 

Korea is increasingly becoming a target of hackers who seek to steal
Internet users¡¯ personal information while shedding its dubious
status as a leading threat to online security. The ¡°Internet Security
Threat Report¡± released by the online security firm Symantec on
Monday ranks Korea 10th as a source of security attacks in the second
half of 2005, down from ninth in the first half and a shaming second
in 2002. The report is produced by analyzing logging records in
firewalls and attack detection systems of Symantec¡¯s 20,000 corporate
customers in 180 countries.

South Korea was the world¡¯s no. 2 after the U.S. as a source of spam
in the first half of last year, accounting for 14 percent of spam
messages in the world, but the nation improved to third place with the
figure declining to 9 percent from July to December.

However, Korea moved up to fifth place from sixth in terms of
infection with bots, malicious programs which provide hackers with
unauthorized control of a computer to steal confidential information
or attack specific websites. By using bots, hackers are able to stop
individual computers or corporate computer systems from working when
they want and to steal financial data and other confidential
information to cause large-scale security failures. Symantec claims
this means nations around the world need to strengthen computer system
security.

China has joined countries on the security black list after it moved
up to second place following the U.S. as a source of security attacks.  
The number of attacks from China increased by 153 percent in the
second half of 2005, 72 percentage points more than the global average
of 81 percent. China¡¯s also rose to second place as a source of spam
responsible for 12 percent, up from fourth place in the first half.