Top 10 malware threats for January

Sunbelt Software announced the top 10 most prevalent malware threats of January 2010. The top seven detections were the same as December, but in a slightly different order. In December and January, six of the top 10 detections were Trojans.

Trojan.Win32.Generic!BT – a generic detection for Trojans that comprised nearly one quarter (23.15 percent) of all the malware found. It remained in the top position for the third month in a row, growing by nearly 20 percent from 18.69 percent of all detections in December. It is a detection that includes many downloaders associated with scareware or rogue security products.

After holding the top spot on the list for most of 2009, the password-stealing Trojan-Spy.Win32.Zbot.gen held the second position on the list for the third consecutive month, decreasing from 6.23 to 4.91 percent of all detections.

Meanwhile, three new detections moved onto this month’s top 10 list. Virtumonde — a generalized description of an adware program with many versions of pop up advertising — constituted 1.23 percent of overall detections. Packed.Win32.TDSS.aa.3 — a sophisticated rootkit and Trojan that is used primarily to redirect search engine results — made up 1.21 percent. Finally, Trojan.HTML.FakeAlert.a — a detection for an HTML file which replaces a desktop background and works with other rogue malware — made up just under one percent of all detections.

The top 10 most prevalent malware threats for the month of January are:

1. Trojan.Win32.Generic!BT – 23.15%
2. Trojan-Spy.Win32.Zbot.gen – 4.91%
3. Exploit.PDF-JS.Gen – 4.55%
4. Trojan.Win32.Generic!SB.0 – 2.40%
5. Trojan.Win32.Malware – 1.93%
6. Trojan.ASF.Wimad – 1.92%
7. INF.Autorun – 1.46%
8. Virtumonde – 1.23%
9. Packed.Win32.TDSS.aa.3 – 1.21%
10. Trojan.HTML.FakeAlert.a – 0.98%