Conficker

EPISODE TWO

Have we defeated it yet?

We did not, although Microsoft offered a $250,000 bounty to
catch the people behind the worm. Simply by looking at the quarterly evolution of
Conficker infections chart, we can definitely say that it is not going to
happen very soon.

Top 10 most infected countries in Q1 2009

Thailand	8.35 %
China	8.20 %
India	7.85 %
Malaysia	7.56 %
Vietnam	6.70 %
Indonesia	6.03 %
Philippines	4.53 %
Australia	2.94 %
France	2.42 %
Italy	2.17 %
Other countries	43.26 %

Top 10 most infected countries in Q2 2009

China	14.59 %
Vietnam	9.44 %
Romania	7.48 %
India	6.72 %
Indonesia	5.78 %
Malaysia	5.66 %
Thailand	5.57 %
Australia	3.49 %
Philippines	2.74 %
Mexico	2.58 %
Other countries	35.94 %

Top 10 most infected countries in Q3 2009

China	12.76 %
India	8.00 %
Vietnam	7.41 %
Thailand	6.65 %
Romania	6.13 %
Malaysia	5.45 %
Indonesia	4.88 %
Australia	3.98 %
Mexico	2.72 %
Colombia	2.71 %
Other countries	39.32 %

Top 10 most infected countries between Q1 and Q3 2009

China	12.96 %
Romania	8.02 %
Vietnam	7.75 %
India	7.48 %
Thailand	6.30 %
Malaysia	5.64 %
Indonesia	5.05 %
Australia	3.63 %
Philippines	2.91 %
Mexico	2.49 %
Other countries	37.76 %

The evolution of Conficker infections reveals
at least three alarming aspects, both for security community and
computer/Internet users:

Malware creators do not sleep nor do they take vacation. The
ingeniosity and skillfulness used to create the five breeds of Conficker are
the strongest evidence that malware authors are always innovative when it comes
to profit.

The high rate of infections also tells that the level of
awareness is still low among users. Not only when it comes to (constantly)
update an OS with the latest fixes against security flaws, but even in terms of
(good sense) removable media scanning against malware (even if it comes from a
trusted sources).

Last but not least, it also shows that many users do not
know that removal tools are available and they could employ them to disinfect
their systems (until is not too late).