Scaremongering over Spyware?

Dynamoo writes "The BBC is reporting that PCs in the UK are infected with over 20 pieces of spyware on average. A frightening statistic, if it is to be believed. In fact, the figures come from Webroot - an anti-spyware firm with a commercial interest in playing up the spyware threat." From the article: "In Poland, 867 of every 1,000 domestic PCs have been infected by trojans, unsolicited programs that can allow remote users to control the machine. It is this international reach that concerns those in authority trying to combat the spread of spyware. "

Comments

True number or not, way too common..

[luvirini]

Regardless of how mch the actual numbers given there are over the top, the actual numbers of PCs having spyware infections is way too many.

Slowly people that I know start to have things in order as I have managed to make them change habits, install tools and such, but not everyone has such aquintances, and even then, the number of times I have cleaned spyware from someones computer is way high...

Seems like a statisticians nightmare

[antifoidulus]

How can you really tell how many people are infected with spyware? It's not a question like, "do you support proposition 84?" where you can call people at random or talk to them on the street. I would be afraid of the guy who came to my door asking if he could test whether or not my computer was infected with spyware(doubly so since I use a mac :P), and if you just ask people, 9/10 they won't know but will probably make up a answer anyway. They could use the numbers sent to them by customers, but that isn't random at all. Their customers are much more likely to have spyware infections or else they wouldn't be seeking their help.
So yeah, it's a number, but not a very convincing one...

And, typical of scaremongering tactics...

[Caspian]

...they are (probably deliberately) confusing the terms "trojan" and "spyware". Is it any wonder that the average user doesn't know the difference between a "virus", "spyware" or "adware", doesn't know the umbrella term "malware", and thinks that any antivirus program is all they need to stay safe?

To this day, most end-users I talk to think that "spyware" is something good, since they hear people talking about "Spybot", which they think is "a program that gets rid of the viruses".

When will we get some REAL end-user education in this topic? Public schools have Sex Ed classes where they teach you how to reduce your risk of getting HIV and the Clap... how about Computer Safety classes where they teach you how to reduce your risk of getting viruses or spyware?

Not necessarily that much scaremongering

[DagdaMor]

When I help out none-techies with their crippled system, they often have in excess of 100 pieces of various malware. I can well believe as an average of the uk that 21 would not be a too unreasonable figure.