The study reviews malware trends and evaluates the capacity of various approaches to provide reliable protection: the classic signature-based approach, proactive approach (heuristics and sandboxing) and a recently developed zero-hour approach that uses network based outbreak detection for identifying new viruses in real time.
IDC's study confirms that although almost all enterprises have AV solutions in place, none are entirely safe from viruses. According to IDC, the vast majority of large companies are still suffering from virus, Trojan and worm attacks that infiltrate their network defenses.
"The growing effectiveness of malware can be explained by its dynamic nature. Malware writers have realized that organizations' reliance on signature-based anti-virus products creates a significant window of vulnerability, and are targeting it in various ways," said Dan Yachin, IDC's Research Director for EMEA Emerging Technologies. "The problem of signature-based AV solutions lies in their reactive nature. Given their lengthy development cycles, signatures developed against new, rapidly propagating attacks cannot prevent mass infection in the first hours. Emerging technologies could have an important role in mitigating those risks.
