Where The Hackers Are Looking These Days
Hackers are looking beyond the operating system to gain access to computers, and they're increasingly targeting Web browsers, E-mail clients, and other applications and client software. Vulnerabilities have been discovered recently in Apple Computer's iTunes, RealNetworks' RealPlayer, Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Mozilla Foundation's Firefox, various Oracle applications, and enterprise data-backup software from Computer Associates and Veritas.
According to InformationWeek Research's U.S. Information Security Survey 2005, operating systems remain the primary point of attack, cited by 43% of survey respondents. But other sources provided holes aplenty, including E-mail attachments (35%), known applications (22%), and unknown applications (10%).
