14 DAY TRIAL // The number of computers infected with the ZeuS banking trojan is four times higher than that of systems infected with SpyEye, according to statistics compiled by Trusteer.
Trusteer specializes in protecting against malware that poses a direct financial risk. Its Rapport product secures browser sessions and prevents trojans from tampering with them.
One year ago, Trusteer added malware removal capabilities to Rapport increasing the product's effectiveness.
Since then, the company has cleaned financial malware from over 1.6 million computers, 72% of cases involving ZeuS or SpyEye variants.
As a result, the company concludes that these two banking trojans "are to date the most serious threat faced by financial institutions and their customers."
ZeuS is one of the oldest trojans still in existence and has, for a long time, been the weapon of choice for cyber fraudsters.
The malware is capable of stealing online banking credentials and other financial data by modifying the pages displayed by browsers in real time.
It's believed that ZeuS' creator quit the malware writing scene last year and left the trojan's code base to the SpyEye author.
However, a few months after the exchange the ZeuS code leaked and has since been available for free on underground forums. It allows anyone to modify the malware to fit their own needs or repurpose it. According to Trusteer CEO Mickey Boodaei, the distribution of ZeuS has almost doubled since the code started being available. This is something that security researchers expected.
But SpyEye has also been gaining ground on its rival. "SpyEye continues to gain market share and has became the second most distributed financial malware with a significant advantage over the rest of the malware crime kits," Boodaei warns.