F-Secure Report Warns XP Zero-Day Attack is Imminent PC World (03/04/14) Bradley, Tony F-Secure has issued a report warning of the possibility of a potent zero-day attack against Windows XP, particularly after official support for the operating system ends on April 8. Microsoft has issued similar warnings, saying cybercriminals could reverse-engineer the patches and updates it issues for more recent versions of Windows to identify potential vulnerabilities in XP and then develop malware that exploits those flaws. F-Secures report goes further in describing the ramifications of new attacks against XP by pointing out that any successful attack against the operating system will be more difficult to remediate than it would be in the latest versions of Windows. F-Secure is urging XP users to upgrade to a newer version of Windows, although it says those who refuse to do so can reduce their risk of malware infection by installing the final updates Microsoft issues for XP and by ensuring that all patches for Microsoft Office have been installed, among other things. XP users also need to be careful about their Web usage and computing habits to fend off malware, F-Secure says. The report also addresses the issue of malware more generally, pointing out that the number of Web-based malware attacks doubled between the first and last halves of 2013. F-Secure says much of the malware reported in the second half of last year targeted vulnerabilities in Java, although the number of Java-related exploits fell during that time period.
Posted on: Sun, 09 Mar 2014 07:50:09 +0000
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