The Hindu Business Line : Stay alert

Do these names ring a bell? Likely you've already recalled that these people, in the 14-34 age group, were charged with unleashing virus attacks in cyber space over a period of time.

The attacks continue, to this day, changing in scope and nature.

Niraj Kaushik, Country Manager, India/SAARC of Trend Micro, says words such as phishing, pharming, spyware, spam are all linked to making money, in today's Internet era.

Not just that, the bad guys are hiring amateurs and professional programmers to write malware/grayware

Also, the Internet itself provides Web sites that `help' in creating viruses and testing their `efficacy.'

According to Valene McNiven, US Treasury Advisor, global cyber crime turned over more money than drug trafficking last year.We, in India, might think we are generally insulated against such attacks. But when five Indian companies have been hit by DDOS (distributed denial of service), within the past six months, there is no ignoring threats. In DDOS attacks, the criminal floods the bandwidth of the victim's network or fills his e-mail box with spam mail, depriving him of the services he is entitled to access.

Denial of service attacks are designed to bring the network to its knees by flooding it with useless traffic. Many DoS attacks, such as the Ping of Death and Teardrop attacks, exploit limitations in the TCP/IP protocols.

For all known DoS attacks, there are software fixes that system administrators can install to limit the damage caused by the attacks. But, like viruses, new DoS attacks are constantly being unleashed by hackers.

According to a PricewaterhouseCoopers report, a recent survey of major enterprises in India showed that 54 per cent of respondents had become victims of economic crime in the two years to 2005, compared with 24 per cent in the previous survey.

Of these victims, 15 per cent had been hit by incidents of `false pretences' - a category of economic crime that includes cyber crimes such as phishing, pharming, and other online fraud.

Most alarmingly, nearly one-third of these cases were detected by chance - so the known crimes may represent only the tip of the iceberg.

Since Internet penetration in India leapt 54 per cent last year to 38.5 million users, we are increasingly exposed to this global scourge.

Basic security solutions and static passwords no longer provide adequate protection, as the report warns.

savitharin@gmail.com