"Although we have seen a 10 percent drop in Zafi.B infections in August, it seems it will not soon disappear," said Carole Theriault, a security specialist with Sophos. This e-mail antispyware tool has been released for several months now and users need to develop more frequent updates. Otherwise, we will see that such viruses continue to dominate the rankings. "
Despite NetSky's arrest, the number of variants of the virus still affects businesses with NetSky.P occupying the No. 2 spot among Sophos' top 10 viruses, alongside four versions of the same. and MyDoom.O, Bagle.AA and Lovgate.V.
"More than 1,200 new viruses were detected in the past month, but none of them reached the top of the list. In fact, the top 10 most dangerous viruses are still old names that have been raging for at least a few weeks, "Theriault said.
August was a special month for virus attacks as Sophos analyzed and blocked up to 1,230 attack codes. According to them, this is the highest number of new viruses ever recorded in a single month since December 2001.
The total number of viruses that Sophos has handled so far has risen to 93,875. The company's statistics show that 9.3% of e-mail traffic in August contained viruses.
The 10 most dangerous viruses in August 2004 (in parentheses is the rate of notification that Sophos receives)
1. Zafi.B (47.4%)
2. NetSky.P (18%)
3. Mydoom.O (7.2%)
4. NetSky.D (4.8%)
5. NetSky.Z (3.9%)
6. Bagle.AA (3.3%)
7. NetSky.B (2.9%)
8. Lovgate.V (1.9%)
9. NetSky.Q (1.5%)
10. NetSky.C (1.4%)
Others: 7.7%.
