New Websense Security Labs Research Shows 75 Percent of Malicious Sites Are From Legitimate, Trusted Sources With “Good” Reputation Scores

SAN DIEGO, CA–(EMWNews – July 29, 2008) – Websense, Inc. (NASDAQ: WBSN)

Highlights / Key Facts:

— 60 percent of the top 100 most popular Web sites either hosted malicious

content or contained a masked redirect to lure unsuspecting victims from

legitimate sites to malicious sites, according to

new research released today from Websense Security Labs™. The top 100 most popular Web sites, many of

which are social networking, Web 2.0 and search sites, represent the

majority of all Web page views and are the most popular target for

attackers. With their large user base, good reputations and support for Web

2.0 applications, these sites provide malicious code authors with abundant

opportunity.

— In the first half of 2008 more than 75 percent of the Web sites

Websense® classified as malicious were actually sites with seemingly

“good” reputations that had been compromised by attackers. This

represents a 50 percent increase from the second half of 2007.

— More than 45 percent of the top 100 most popular Web sites support

user-generated content.

— Websense Security Labs found that 29 percent of malicious Web attacks

included data-stealing code, demonstrating that attackers are after

essential information and data.

— The convergence of blended Web and email threats continues to increase.

Websense Security Labs reports that now more than 76.5 percent of all

emails in circulation in the past six months contained links to spam

sites and/or malicious Web sites. This represents an 18 percent increase

since December 2007.

— Websense Security Labs uses the patent-pending Websense

ThreatSeeker™ Network to discover, classify and monitor global

Internet threats and trends. Security researchers use the Internet

security intelligence from the system, which includes more than 50 million

real-time data collecting systems that parse one billion pieces of content

daily, to publish security trends and protect customers.

Links / URLs:

Podcast:

— SC Magazine podcast:Super Cybercrime with Websense Chief Technology

Officer Dan Hubbard

http://podcasts.scmagazine.com/show/2_2008-01-28T14_46_20-08_00

— Websense YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/WBSNMKTG

— Del.icio.us: http://del.icio.us/informationprotection

— Websense Security Labs ThreatSeeker Network Whitepaper:

http://www.websense.com/welcome/MiscLandings/ThreatSeekerNetwork/index.php

— Websense Security Labs presentation from CanSec 2008: “Web-Wreckutation”

http://securitylabs.websense.com/content/Assets/websense_cansec_2008.pdf

— Websense Security Labs site: http://securitylabs.websense.com/

Quotes:



--  "Today attackers are overwhelmingly forgoing creating their own

    malicious sites and targeting legitimate Web sites that have a built in

    base of visitors," said Dan Hubbard, chief technology officer,

    Websense. "There is an element of trust in the Web 2.0 world that the

    Web sites we frequent every day are safe, but attackers are taking

    advantage of the 'good reputations' of Web sites to launch attacks.

    Most Web security and URL filtering technology today heavily rely on

    a Web sites' reputation, but this method is outdated. In terms of

    security, the URL doesn't matter anymore -- it's all about the dynamic

    content that is served up on the page. To safely use the Internet

    today, organizations need Web security protection that can analyze the

    content on the Web page in real-time."



--  "With legitimate Web sites that our employees may try to go to for

    business reasons, increasingly getting compromised by criminals, the

    research on the latest threats and the Web security protection from

    Websense is critical to our organization," said Websense customer Tim

    Lawrence, information technology (IT), security analyst at

    AutomationDirect.

Websense News RSS Feed: All Websense

News RSS Feed

Websense Security Labs Alerts RSS Feed:

http://securitylabs.websense.com/content/alertsRSS.xml

Websense Security Labs Blog RSS Feed:

http://securitylabs.websense.com/content/blogsRSS.xml

About Websense, Inc.

Websense, Inc. (NASDAQ: WBSN), a global leader in integrated Web, messaging

and data protection technologies, provides Essential Information

Protection™ for more than 42 million employees at more than 50,000

organizations worldwide. Distributed through its global network of channel

partners, Websense software and hosted security solutions

help organizations block malicious code, prevent the loss of confidential

information and enforce Internet use and security policies. For more

information, visit www.websense.com.

Websense and Websense Enterprise are registered trademarks of Websense,

Inc. in the United States and certain international markets. Websense has

numerous other unregistered trademarks in the United States and

internationally. All other trademarks are the property of their respective

owners.

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