As we turn the page to 2012, it makes sense to sit back and take a look at what happened during the past twelve months in the IT Security world. If we were to summarize the year in one word, I think it would probably be “explosive.” The multitude of incidents, stories, facts, new trends and intriguing actors is so big that it makes it very hard to crack into top 10 of security stories of 2011.

What I was aiming for with this list is to remember the stories that also indicate major trends or the emergence of major actors on the security scene. By looking at these stories, we can get an idea of what will happen in 2012.

Dark Market was one of the most famous underground forums ever, for several reasons. The most important one was that one of the administrators was an infiltrated FBI agent running a covert operation that ultimately lead to the arrest of 60 people worldwide. The forum was shut down in 2008, when Dark Market was probably the most important carding forum in the world.

I now travel a lot. Trips - mostly business - make up about half my life.
Conferences, exhibitions, meetings (with short stops at the seaside or ski resorts if I stop at all). And at these events I'm asked lots of different questions. Last year one of the most frequently asked questions was my opinion about Microsoft's anti-virus, and the changes it might cause in the anti-virus industry.

That question started me thinking about the situation on the anti-virus market - and here's the result

War driving and trainspotting are two urban phenomena which don’t seem to have anything in common. Trainspotters can be found at stations, at engine depots, and alongside the rails themselves, noting down train and engine serial numbers. Trainspotting is most popular in the UK and the USA, although trainspotters can be found in other countries.

The point of this seemingly pointless hobby is to ‘spot’ and record the serial numbers of all engines (and, for the true enthusiast, carriages as well) currently in use. Trainspotters exchange information about routes among themselves, and trainspotting became something of a cult activity after the release of the film of the same name.

So what has this got to do with wardriving? At first glance, absolutely nothing. But while I was in London researching WiFi networks, I started to notice some similarities:

Trainspotters and wardrivers have the same goal: to collect the maximum amount of data possible, whether it’s access points or engine numbers.
They can both be found outside in any weather, at any time of the year.
They use the same tools: laptops, mobile phones and PDAs.

The only difference is that trainspotters tend to stay in one place, whereas wardrivers are in constant motion, trying to cover as big an area as possible.

While I was in London, I felt I had to go and pay my respects to these dedicated hobbyists, and travelled to the trainspotters’ Mecca: King’s Cross and St Pancras stations. The trainspotters quietly, concentratedly entered data into their PDAs, and my wardriving laptop hummed quietly in my backpack, constantly scanning the surrounding digital environment. A meeting of two very different, but very similar, worlds.

You can read more about my London wardriving here

The use of malicious code tends to follow well-trodden channels: in other words, if software is widely used, then virus writers will focus their efforts on exploiting its vulnerabilites. A recent report suggests that the use of instant messaging will increase considerably in the next few years. We've already seen an increase in IM worms. If IDC is correct about the growth of IM, virus writers will almost certainly continue to target it further.

The anatomy of the Bozori worm outbreaks that we've seen in the last day or so leads us to believe that we're witnessing the emergence of a new type of infection, what we're calling the 'business worm'.

Read the full story here

Full descriptions of Bagle.ax and Bagle.ay are now available.