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Rogue AV was the common denominator threat to all users, according to findings in the new Microsoft Security Intelligence Report

Enterprises and consumers each suffer from different types of malware threats, but both were hit hard by rogue antivirus attacks last year, according to new data released by Microsoft today.

Version 8 of the new Microsoft Security Intelligence Report (SIR) for the first time separated enterprise user and consumer user malware trend data. The report found that enterprise users contract more worms, while consumers contract Trojans and adware. SIR 8 is based on data gathered from 500 million PCs across the globe between July and December 2009.

"In the enterprise, worms are more of a problem, which is not a surprise in that you have networks with trusted file shares and USB devices, and they are more susceptible to those transmission mechanisms," says Matt Thomlinson, general manager of product security in Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing group. "This is the first time we've had data allowing us to separate [enterprise and consumer machines] and show differences [in malware prevalence.]"

Worms were found in 32 percent of enterprise PCs, followed by miscellaneous Trojans (18 percent), unwanted software (16 percent), Trojan downloaders and droppers (13 percent), password-stealers and monitoring tools (7 percent), backdoor programs (5 percent), viruses (4 percent), exploits (3 percent), adware (3 percent), and spyware (1 percent).

Consumer PCs had more miscellaneous Trojans -- one-fourth of them. Worms and Trojan downloaders and droppers were found in 15 percent of consumer Windows machines, followed by unwanted software (13 percent), adware (12 percent), password-stealers and monitoring tools (9 percent), backdoor programs (4 percent), viruses (3 percent), and exploits and spyware (2 percent).

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