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Number of Viruses
- 2009-05-03
- Categorized in: VTutor Introduction
| There were over 50,000 computer viruses in 2000 and that number was then and still is growing rapidly. Sophos, in a print ad in June 2005 claims "over 103,000 viruses." And, Symantec, in April 2008 is reported to have claimed the number is over one million. Fortunately, only a small percentage of these are circulating widely. |
There are more MS-DOS/Windows viruses than all other types of viruses combined (by a large margin). Estimates of exactly how many there are vary widely and the number is constantly growing.
In 1990, estimates ranged from 200 to 500; then in 1991 estimates ranged from 600 to 1,000 different viruses. In late 1992, estimates were ranging from 1,000 to 2,300 viruses. In mid-1994, the numbers vary from 4,500 to over 7,500 viruses. In 1996 the number climbed over 10,000. 1998 saw 20,000 and 2000 topped 50,000. It's easy to say there are more now. Indeed, in April 2008, the BBC reported
that Symantec now claims "that the security firm's anti-virus programs detect to 1,122,311" viruses and that "almost two thirds of all malicious code threats currently detected were created during 2007."
The confusion exists partly because it's difficult to agree on how to count viruses. New viruses frequently arise from someone taking an existing virus that does something like put a message out on your screen saying: "Your PC is now stoned" and changing it to say something like "Donald Duck is a lie!". Is this a new virus? Most experts say yes. But, this is a trivial change that can be done in less than two minutes resulting in yet another "new" virus.
More confusion arises with some companies counting viruses+worms+Trojans as a unit and some not.
Another problem comes from viruses that try to conceal themselves from scanners by mutating. In other words, every time the virus infects another file, it will try to use a different version of itself. These viruses are known as polymorphic viruses.
One example, the Whale (an early, huge, clumsy 10,000 byte virus), creates 33 different versions of itself when it infects files. At least one vendor counted this as 33 different viruses on their list. Many of the large number of viruses known to exist have not been detected in the wild but probably exist only in someone's virus collection.
David M. Chess of IBM's High Integrity Computing Laboratory reported in the November 1991 Virus Bulletin that "about 30 different viruses and variants account for nearly all of the actual infections that we see in day-to-day operation." In late 2007, about 580 different viruses, worms, and Trojans (and some of these are members of a single family) account for all the virus-related malware that actually spread in the wild. To keep track visit the Wildlist
, a list which reports virus sightings.
How can there be so few viruses active when some experts report such high numbers? This is probably because most viruses are poorly written and cannot spread at all or cannot spread without betraying their presence. Although the actual number of viruses will probably continue to be hotly debated, what is clear is that the total number of viruses is increasing, although the active viruses not quite as rapidly as the numbers might suggest.
Summary
- By number, there are well over 100,000 known computer viruses.
- Only a small percentage of this total number account for those viruses found in the wild, however. Most exist only in collections.
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| Virus Behavior | Virus Names |





thank you !
http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/
And, then also search through their analysis of various viruses and learn from that.
Good luck.
http://www.iobit.com/security360 - IObit Security 360:
Update: Yes
Version: Free or Full (Purchase required)
Scan(s): Full, Quick, Smart
Hard Drive Space: 20.28 MB
Tray Disk Space: 20.30 MB (Disableable) (the tray disk space thing is the automatic shield similar to McAfee's that runs a constant shield on your computer. Although it is helpful it is not a necessity and you can disable it if it slows your computer down too much by right-clicking the icon at the bottom right of your screen and selecting "exit.")
Other Tools: Free Space Cleaner, Privacy Sweeper, Hijack Scan
Typical Scan Run-time: 0 hours, 20 minutes
http://www.malwarebytes.org/ - Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware
Update: Yes
Versions: Free and Expert (payment required)
Scans: Full, Quick
Hard Drive Space: 32.49 MB
Tray Disk Space: 0 KB
Typical Scan Run-time: 1 hours, 45 minutes
They are both free, another program that requires subscription and payment is Norton Internet Security. If you run back-to-back scans with these programs everyday and keep them updated your computer will remain safe and secure.
Thank you CKnow for these awesome tutorials! They helped better my understanding of viruses.
[Please contact your anti-virus vendor. --DaBoss]
http://antivirus.about.com/od/macintoshresource/Macintosh_Viruses_and_Mac_Virus_Resources.htm
...as it took the Black Hat people about 20 seconds or so to break into the operating system the last time there was a contest.
Mac before OS X: 60 - 80 viruses.
Mac after OS X: 0 viruses.
PC: more than 10,000 viruses.
http://www.sophos.com/pressoffice/news/articles/2006/02/macosxleap.html
O.K. you know the truth. Then what are the real numbers?
I said you were wrong about OSX having zero and pointed you to the first one found for that OS. There have been more and Apple even admits that because it has a scanner of sorts built into the OS and updates the list of things looked for on a semi-regular basis.
Apple has fewer viruses than Windows. OK, satisfied now? But, it still has some.
How many exactly? Ask your friendly local anti-virus software company as I don't keep an exact count.