Most people (we hope) are now safe from worms like MyDoom and Bagle, but new strains continue to be developed, the latest incorporating rootkits, which is troubling news.
The rootkit technology, which The Register reports originally "featured only as a component of more sophisticated and exotic forms of malware," has now found its way into more mainstream malware.
Rootkits can be used to completely hide registry keys, files and processes from the Operating System, making them extremely difficult to detect and a nightmare to remove. Thus, the best defence against rootkit malware is to prevent the worm or trojan carrying it from penetrating your security by staying patched, and keeping your virus scanner up to date so that it can be detected and stopped upon arrival.
It's not just malware authors writing rootkits, in fact, they probably picked up a trick or two from Sony BMG, who last year rewarded customers wanting to listen to music on their PC by installing a rootkit to hide DRM software. Not only did it breach users trust, but it opened the computer up to serious security threats. You know what they say: If it's good enough for big businesses, it's good enough for malware writers.
