The start of a new year is a good time to look ahead and forecast what will be the biggest developments in the threat landscape in 2013.

AVG predicts the ‘traditional’ threats targeting businesses and consumers will be accompanied by more recent developments such as attacks on virtualised cloud infrastructure; and threats to privacy from both legitimate and criminal sources as they seek to profit from personal data.

Michael McKinnon, Security Advisor at AVG Technologies AU, said: “Our lives are becoming more closely intertwined with online services and so the potential rewards for cybercriminals in that area grow too. I expect to see more attacks on the cloud services that businesses and consumers rely on day-to-day, both to cause disruption and to steal personal and financial data.”

McKinnon warns that consumers must expect to also find their privacy under attack from legitimate businesses seeking to maximise profits by using personal data without users’ consent.

AVG’s top five digital threats facing businesses and consumers in 2013 are:

1. Privacy: Online      advertising on PCs, tablets and smartphones will become even more      aggressively personalised as businesses seek to increase capitalise on      users’ privacy. Advertisers will use browser tracking, social media      trawling and geo-location data to identify individual users, and then      serve them a customised program of ads, all without the users’ consent.

2. Cloud security: Attacks      against virtualised cloud infrastructure will expose the risks in public      cloud services and the large additional investments needed to better      secure them. Well-known cloud systems such as Dropbox,      SkyDrive,      Cloud      Drive (Amazon) and Google      Drive have reportedly been attacked by malware, and we will see an      increase in attacks against such systems from Denial of Service (DoS)      /Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.

3. Mobile threats: As the      world’s most popular mobile operating system, Google’s Android OS is now      the prime target for smartphone and tablet malware. Due to security      enhancements in Android 4.2, threats will become more sophisticated and      use polymorphic code that is designed to mutate in order to avoid      detection by traditional app store security.

4. PC threats: The      steady increase in popularity of Windows 8 will inspire hackers to reveal      new vulnerabilities, develop new-style malware and fraudware, and present      new proof-of-concept exploits. The number of infected websites targeting      PCs will also increase with the growing popularity of ‘commercial’ exploit      kits such as Blackhole, while users’ problems will be compounded by an      increased reliance on built-in security systems.

5. Mobile-to-PC threats:      Increased connectivity between mobile devices and PCs, combined with the      growing Bring Your Own Device trend will make it much easier for malware      and viruses to spread across business and home networks. We also expect to      register more      MITMO (Man-In-The-Mobile) attacks that target PC and mobile internet banking      apps. These multi-factor authentication attacks will be stealthier, more      polished and more location-oriented.

Michael McKinnon said: “As cybercriminals and hackers use ever more sophisticated attack tools, so too should users of the latest technologies do everything they can to protect their personal information and finances. You may have data in the cloud but keep your feet on the ground! To have the best chance of beating the criminals, run always on, automatically updating antivirus on every one of your Internet-connected devices – be they house bound or mobile.”