Rootkit numbers rocketing up, McAfee says

...a couple of interesting excerpts:
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An "open-source environment" for development of stealth code among hackers is driving this rapid growth, McAfee said. Collaborative Web sites and blogs contain hundreds of lines of rootkit code for recompiling and enhancing the technology, along with rootkit binary executables, McAfee said.
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McAfee noted an increase in commercial software using stealth techniques to conceal code. Companies that have turned to the use of such technology include record label Sony BMG, which used it to hide copy protection code, and Symantec, which later stepped back from using it in its Norton SystemWorks PC-tuning application. The report did not label such stealth technology as rootkits, a word it said should be used in relation to malicious software.

http://news.com.com/Rootkit+numbers+...3-6061878.html

Was anyone here around during the Michaelangelo scare, the heavily leveraged non-event that made McAfee? Do any of you wonder why some of us old guard just don't trust what comes out of McAfee's lying mouth?

Granted, they may be seeing more rootkit techniques, not so much because there are more and newer variants in the wild but because they are now paying attention to them. The tools they are using are now geared to see the Sony BMG type kits and other variants as red flags, where they just ignored them before.

To be honest, it is a bit scarey that these have been ignored by the AV dudes for so long, simply because they were from Sony or some other legitimate business. From where I stand, they are simply jumping on a bandwagon to make more money by increasing the FUD. If they were real security software companies and had our best interests at heart, they would have been killing these kits a couple years ago. They should have been leading this charge, not bringing up the rear.

I knew a guy once that would throw nails in the road to increase bussiness at his tire shop.....antivirus software companies are a multi-million dollar corporations with out the virus they have no job ? ? ?