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Computer Vulnerability-to-Worm Cycle Compressing Dramatically
Foundstone Inc., expert in strategic security, published an analysis of computer worm history revealing a potentially dangerous trend. The vulnerability-to-worm cycle has compressed from 288 days in 1999 to just 10 days in 2004, putting organizations and consumers at higher risk for attack.
Foundstone's analysis centers on high profile worms released between 1999 and 2004, including: Melissa, Sadmind, Sonic, Bugbear, Code Red, Nimda, Spida, MS SQL Slammer, Slapper, Blaster, Witty and Sasser. Worms that took advantage of user interaction (e.g. executing attachments) and remotely controlled "bots" were reviewed, but not included in the trend report in order to focus on completely automated threats.
"This trend is alarming as it demonstrates what we have sensed for years, that the cycle from vulnerability to worm is shortening dramatically -- putting increasing pressure on IT departments to remediate vulnerabilities faster than ever," said Stuart McClure, president and chief technology officer for Foundstone and author of the worm research. "The window within which the good guys have to work is closing fast."
"IT security is a chess game in which cyberattackers have the white pieces and thus move first," commented John Pescatore, analyst for Gartner. "Organizations can control the middle of the chessboard by implementing vulnerability management and intrusion prevention approaches to prevent and respond quickly to attacks."
"In today's world, it's nearly impossible to protect your enterprise's digital assets without a vulnerability management system," said Dave Cole, vice president of product management for Foundstone. "Foundstone Enterprise customers benefit from early warning of breaking threats, enabling a timely, effective response for even today's rapid turn-around worms. In addition, if the security of a customer is ever compromised for any reason, Foundstone Enterprise gives them the ability to quickly assess which machines on the network have been affected."
Foundstone's Enterprise Risk Solutions(TM) software helps organizations comprehensively discover, inventory, prioritize, and remediate all assets on a global network. The suite provides exceptionally accurate, high-speed vulnerability assessment of all network assets, intuitive reports and metrics, and a tightly integrated threat correlation module which correlates critical threats with prioritized assets so security and network operations can focus on the assets that matter the most. 19.05.2004, Foundstone(R) Inc.
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