Cyber-criminals to reach a new frontier

With the Symbian mobile operating systems Android and the environment becomes popular malware, a new report confirms mobile malware as a new challenge for cybercrime.

McAfee Q1 report also reveals that threats in the first quarter of 2011, spam is remained at its lowest level since 2007.

"Even though this past quarter once again showed that spam has slowed, it doesn't mean that cybercriminals aren't actively pursuing alternate avenues. We're seeing a lot of emerging threats, such as android malware," says Vincent Weafer, senior vice president of McAfee Labs.With its growing popularity the android device platform solidified its spot as the second most popular environment for mobile malware behind the symbian operating system.

"The number of malware attacks on android devices found in a single month this quarter is the same as reported in the whole of year 2007," says Vinoo Thomas, Technical Product Manager, McAfee.McAfee Labs found that the most prominent types of android mobile malware were Android/DrdDream, Android/Drad, Adnroid/StemySCR.A and AndroidBgyoulu, which affected everything from games to applicatioin to SMS data.

"The cybercriminals behind the Zeus crimeware toolkit have also directed attacks toward the mobile platform, creating new versions of Zitmo mobile malware for both Symbian and Windows Mobile systems," says the report. .