GFI Software has announced the top 10 most prevalent malware threats for the month of February 2011 as detected by scans performed by its anti-malware solution, VIPRE Antivirus, and its antispyware tool, CounterSpy.

According to GFI Software, a trend observed since last summer continued, with many of the same types of Trojan horses continuing to dominate the threat landscape. GFI’s statistics revealed that Trojans made up six of the top 10 malware threats in February 2011. Topping the list, Trojans detected asTrojan.Win32.Generic!BT accounted for 22.97 percent of total detections, holding its spot as the number one threat.

These Trojans are downloaders associated with rogue security programs known as Fake Antivirus software, sometimes referred to as “scareware”. Once they are on a user’s system, these programs perform a fake scan of a victim’s computer for malware then display false warnings that the machine is infected in an attempt to convince victims to purchase fake security software.

Top 10 Detections for February 2011 as reported by GFI Software:

Detection Type Percent

1. Trojan.Win32.Generic!BT Trojan 22.97%

2. Trojan-Spy.Win32.Zbot.gen Trojan 3.46%

3. Trojan.Win32.Generic.pak!cobra Trojan 2.89%

4. Zugo LTD (v) Adware 2.52%

5. Fraudtool.Win32.Securityshield.ek!c (v) Trojan 2.00%

6. Trojan.Win32.Generic!SB.0 Trojan 1.72%

7. INF.Autorun (v) Trojan 1.66%

8. Worm.Win32.Downad.Gen (v) Worm 1.48%

9. Pinball Corporation (v) Adware 1.19%

10. Exploit.PDF-JS.Gen (v) PDF exploit 0.83%

The top 10 results represent the number of times a particular malware infection was detected during GFI’s VIPRE and CounterSpy scans that report back to GFI’s community of opt-in users. These threats are classified as moderate to severe based on method of installation among other criteria established by GFI Labs.

Source: securityweek.com