A few facts and figures regarding viruses for 2010, to give perspective and raise awareness (facts and figures provided by PandaLabs):

– In 2010, a third of all existing viruses were created.

That is, in the last 12 months, 34% of all existing malware in history has been created and classified.

– Trojans are currently the dominating type of malware.

Trojan horses are a specific type of malware that, similar to the  the Greek story of Troy, allow for intrusion of a system from within, opening the door to external control by a hacker. Currently, 56% of malware are Trojans.

– Thailand, China and Taiwan are the top infected countries.

Let that be a lesson to those who don’t patch their operating systems with Windows updates (the biggest percentages of illegal copies of Windows are in Asia, and Microsoft does not provide updates to pirate copies of Windows).

– Top infection methods were social media exploits, BlackHat SEO techniques, and zero-day vulnerabilities.

Social engineering is covered in this article, BlackHat SEO techniques are described in this one, and zero-day vulnerabilities defined here.

Don’t be a statistic. Keep your computer updated, a sound security solution in place, and use common sense when surfing the internet or handling emails.