Financial motives are triggering a massive explosion of malware variants and spam designed to evade traditional signature-based detection mechanisms. In the early days, it was all about the destructive nature of viruses. Today, however, IT management must contend with highly sophisticated spyware. Keyloggers, rootkits and Trojans are the fundamental building blocks of third generation malware that is delivered via spam and infected Web sites. The number of possible variants created for this malware is unlimited and is contributing to exponential growth that is clogging both computers and networks.

This white paper will discuss the prevalence and type of threats, how to recognize them and make recommendations for safeguarding systems for IT managers.