Consumers to spend $22 billion fighting malware attacks in 2013: Study

Consumers will spend USD 22 billion on checking malware attacks this year, while companies will invest a whopping USD 114 billion in dealing with such malicious softwares, a study has said.

According to the study conducted by market research group IDC and commissioned by Microsoft Corporation, the chances of infection by unexpected malware are one in three for consumers and three in 10 for businesses.

Malwares or malicious softwares are intended to damage or disable computers and computer systems.

"Consumers will spend 1.5 billion hours and USD 22 billion identifying, repairing and recovering from the impact of malware, while global enterprises will spend USD 114 billion to deal with the impact of a malware induced cyber attack," Microsoft India said in a release.

Although some computer users may actively seek pirated software in hopes of saving money, the chances of infection by unexpected malware are one in three for consumers and three in 10 for businesses, it added.

"Software is pirated in order to save money, however, the reality is that with pirated and counterfeit software, the user ends up paying for malware, Trojan, adware and other harmful viruses," Microsoft India Director (Genuine Software Initiative) Sumeet Khanna said.

The survey, which was done in 10 countries, covered 1,104 consumer respondents, 973 business user respondents and 268 CIO/IT manager respondents.

The survey respondents said 32 percent of their PCs come without operating systems and 12 per cent did not install security updates. 30 per cent of consumer respondents did not install security updates and nearly 70 per cent of consumers who use pirated software had problems with it.

That apart, 64 percent of the respondents who had used counterfeit software experienced security issues, while, 45 per cent said counterfeit software slowed their PCs and software had to be uninstalled.

Also 48 per cent of respondents said that their greatest concern with using counterfeit software was data loss and 29 per cent were most concerned with identity theft.

The study also found that a very high percentage of corporate users download software unauthorised as per their corporate policy, exposing another risk to the workplace.

Embedding malware with counterfeit software is a new method for criminals to prey on computer users who are unaware of the potential danger, Khanna said.