New Report Beckons 'Cyber Arms Race,' Explains Black Hole Kit

Espionage has gone digital and we’re just now seeing the beginnings of what will prove to be a “cyber arms race,” according to Mikko Hypponen, Chief Research Officer for the F-Secure, the Finnish security firm. Hypponen laid out his thoughts and recapped the last seven months in threats in the latest edition of the company’s Threat Report (.PDF), released today.

Hypponen goes on to cite attacks like Duqu and Flame when reasoning the world would soon bear witness to a “new revolution, focusing on information operations and cyber warfare.”

In the report, F-Secure also breaks down the surging Blackhole exploit kit, citing statistics from compromised sites and spam emails triggered by the kit. While nearly 52 percent of spammed domains were hosted in the U.S., the spam emails, which were generally about “Bill Statements” and “Product Offers,” were received from addresses in Europe 42 percent of the time, Asia 27 percent of the time and South America 23 percent of the time. The following infographic helps simplify the Blackhole/spam connection further:

To read the full Threat Report, head here. (.PDF)