ZOMBIE COMPUTERS! Or, 55,000 compromised computers in NZ

Now that we’ve got your attention…

A Statistics New Zealand national ISP survey showed that about 55,000 New Zealand computers were compromised, independent cyber safety watch dog Netsafe said today.

The Internet Service Provider Survey 2011 found that about 45% ISPs monitored Internet traffic for signs of compromised security, including pharming, phishing, Trojans and botnets, or a collection of compromised computers that have been set up to forward transmission, such as spam and viruses, to other computers on the Internet.

The survey found about one third of ISPs who monitored threats reported the most common activity was monitoring for botnets (or zombified computers, as they’re technically known).

The survey said in the year ended June 2011, 4% of subscribers of ISPs who monitored showed signs of compromised security. 

With broadband subscribers increasing 14% to nearly 1.5 million between June 2010 and June 2011, this meant there were about 55,000 unsafe residential Internet connections in the country, NetSafe said.

For the technologically savvy, this could be translated as about 55,000 computers having been infected with the Rage virus (should’ve stayed in that apartment…)

NetSafe executive director Martin Crocker said it was good to see a growing number of ISP’s monitoring their traffic for signs of the infection compromised computers.

“The bad news is that these results show that a very significant number of Kiwi homes are likely to be using computer connections that are unsafe, potentially putting their data and other users at risk.”

NetSafe said an infected computer might still seem to function normally (NBR notes particularly if their irises are different colours), and it was probable that many of the 55,000 infected households would not know their connection was compromised.

Mr Crocker said Malware could be used to steal information including credit card details, destroy data, drain data caps or attack other computers.

“If your computer is compromised, you are no longer exclusively in control of it.  The good news is that it is relatively easy to but basic security measures in place to protect your computer,” Mr Crocker said.

“A good level of protection is achieved by installing anti-virus and anti-spyware software, having an active firewall, and setting software to automatically update.”