The year 2008 was a time security threats and malicious activity
reached a tipping point, and 2009 stands to be the year critical
infrastructure systems become prime targets for cyber criminals and the
global financial crisis will be exploited for a variety of malicious
activities, according to a new report released from VeriSign iDefense
Security Intelligence Services, a provider of Internet infrastructure
services for the networked world.

The report, "2009 Cyber Threats and Trends" seeks to aid education
efforts about cyber security threats facing networks, enterprises and
end-users by highlighting important trends that emerged in 2008, and
attempts to predict security trends and disruptors that may develop in
2009 with lasting consequences for businesses in the coming decade.

Over the course of the past year, the report said, cyber crimes
continued to increase in both frequency and severity thanks to new
exploits and organizations to perpetrate them. Cyber Cartels, groups of
young and modern cyber criminals likened by VeriSign iDefense to drug
cartels of the 1980s, targeted commercial -- not individual -- banking
accounts for fraud operations and security measures meant to protect
those accounts and routinely defeated the protections.

Additionally, cyber warfare has become a reality in today's political
climate, and several regions are seeing a rise in politically and
financially motivated activities. According to VeriSign iDefense,
Russian hackers are the most effective group when it comes to cyber
fraud, while Chinese hackers utilize amateur hacking groups for
low-level espionage operations.

"The cyber security landscape has fundamentally changed where 'script
kiddies' no longer perpetrate the lion's share of malicious activity
online," said Jason Greenwood, vice president and general manager,
VeriSign iDefense Security Intelligence Services. "Professionalized
cyber criminals, the rise of cyber cartels or extremists using online
fraud as a means to fund their operations, and cyber espionage and
warfare show how we have entered a new era of online security threats."

2009 Predictions and Long-Term Disruptors include:

-- Critical Infrastructure, notably the Supervisory Control and Data
Acquisition systems (SCADA) that operate them, will likely see
increased attacks in 2009. SCADA systems are used to deliver such
services as electrical power transmission, oil and gas pipelines, large
communications systems, and water treatment and distribution -- The
current global financial crisis will provide unprecedented
opportunities for cyber criminals or spies to exploit the turmoil
caused by the crisis and the resulting institutional mergers,
acquisitions, and collapses -- The FastFlux infrastructure, which uses
computers compromised by botnets to maintain dispersed and untainted IP
space for criminal ventures such as phishing, will likely see increased
use. This will make current phishing takedown measures less effective
and will require security professionals and institutions, which are
often the targets of phishing attacks, to come up with new defense
measures -- Cyber Warfare has gone from a purely theoretical tool to a
technically practical, common component of most political arguments.
VeriSign iDefense believes organizations or groups aligned with Russia
will perpetrate the majority of these attacks -- Middle Eastern cyber
cartels will likely increase online fraud operations to support their
agendas

"Though we have outlined a number of trends we expect to see in 2009,
we also believe other disruptors will begin in the coming year and will
pose hardships for security professionals in the years to come," said
Rick Howard, Intelligence Director, VeriSign iDefense Security
Intelligence Services. "The increased use of mobile phone platforms,
virtual worlds, and the interconnection of devices with the
implementation of IPv6 will provide new attack vectors that must be
considered now, before they take hold."