EXPERT SAYS : EXPECT MORE CYBER-ESPIONAGE THIS COMING 2012

The security industry expects the number of cyber-espionage attacks to increase this coming 2012 and the malware used for this purpose to become increasingly sophisticated.

In the past two years there has been a surge in the number of malware-based attacks that resulted in sensitive data being stolen from government agencies, defense contractors, Fortune 500 companies, human rights organizations and other institutions.

Threats like Stuxnet, which is credited with setting back Iran's nuclear program by several years, or its successor, Duqu, have shocked the security industry with their level of sophistication. Experts believe that they are only the beginning and that more highly advanced Malware will be launched in 2012.

However, despite the emergence of Stuxnet and Duqu, security experts don't believe that the world is actually watching a cyberwar in progress .  

Countries like the U.S., U.K., Germany, China and India have established specialized teams and centers to defend government assets against cyberattacks and to even retaliate, if necessary. However, determining who is behind Internet-based hostile operations with certainty is impossible most of the time and that's just one of the problems.

Threats like Stuxnet and Duqu could very well lead to major international cyber-conflicts in the future, but for now companies and governments should be more worried about cyber-espionage attacks that use simpler data exfiltration tools.

These unsophisticated, yet effective, pieces of malware are known in the security industry as Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) and are usually distributed via social engineering. Operation Aurora, Shady RAT, GhostNet, Night Dragon and Nitro, are all examples of APT attacks reported during the last couple of years that have affected hundreds of organizations worldwide.

The number of APT attacks is likely to escalate in 2012 and defending against them requires frequent employee training and more aggressive protection technologies like those based on white listing, file reputation and application behavior.

Technologies that can check a file's reputation, age and regional popularity, before allowing it to be executed on a system can also be used to block APTs that were designed to evade traditional anti-malware detection methods.

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By Dude