Jan 18, 2011 18:58 GMT  ·  By

According to a recently released report from Symantec, attack toolkits are directly responsible for over sixty percent of malicious activity on the Web and their popularity is ever increasing.

The report [pdf] attributes the increased prevalence of attack kits, also known as exploit packs or drive-by download toolkits, to their ease of use and effectiveness.

Researchers warn that recent advancements brought to these threats, like the ability to quickly update them with new exploits or the switch to a subscription-based model, have contributed to their success.

By removing the need of the programming skills required to put together a successful Web exploit attack, the toolkits allow for more cybercriminals to engage in such activities.

"In the past, hackers had to create their own threats from scratch. This complex process limited the number of attackers to a small pool of highly skilled cybercriminals," says Stephen Trilling, senior vice president, Symantec Security Technology and Response.

"Today's attack toolkits make it relatively easy for even a malicious novice to launch a cyberattack. As a result, we expect to see even more criminal activity in this area and a higher likelihood that the average user will be victimized," he adds.

A true ecosystem of services has also formed around these attack toolkits. For example, criminals who specialize in black hat search engine optimization (BHSEO), also known as search results poisoning, are getting paid to drive traffic to attack pages.

Others handle mass injection or malvertizing attacks with the purpose of getting malicious code inserted into legitimate websites and hijacking their traffic.

According to Symantec, MPack, Neosploit, Nukesploit P4ck, and Phoenix are the most prevalent Web exploit packs.

The company detects over 4.4 million malicious Web pages every month and notes that search terms related to the adult entertainment account for 44% of keywords that lead to them.

Users are strongly advised to keep their software and operating systems up to date in order to limit the attack surface of their computers. Free programs like Secunia Personal Software Inspector can make this process a lot easier.