We've just released the 3rd quarter ScanSafe Global Threat Report (GTR) which provides a snapshot of the Web-based malware threat for each quarter of 2008 (and some 4th quarter 2007 data). As we first did in our May to May comparison, we also gauged risk level changes for the customer focus group, based on malware block data from corporate customers that were common to all periods from May 2007 onward. This allows us to see, for example, how the same customer's risk of exposure to Web-based malware changes from month to month. In the case of backdoors and password stealers, the same customer faced a 499% greater risk of exposure to those worst-type threats in September 2008 than they did in January 2008.

We also looked at the risk by vertical. While all customers faced a 553% increased rate of exposure in 3Q08 compared to 4Q07, we wanted to know if some industry sectors experienced a higher rate of exposure compared to other vertical sectors. The results of that analysis were pretty disturbing. The  verticals that experienced a higher than average rate of exposure were those companies engaged in the Energy & Oil sector, Pharmaceutical & Chemical, and the Engineering & Construction industry, followed by Transportation & Shipping, Media & Publishing, Travel, Education, Food & Beverage, and Finance.

On a more positive note, Government agencies were at 0%, which indicates they were at neither higher nor lower rates of exposure compared to other verticals. At -65%, Aviation & Automotive had the lowest rate of exposure compared to other verticals. A chart of the top 5 verticals was included in the 3Q08 GTR. We'll be completing a full analysis of the vertical risk and publishing those details separately sometime in the next week.

In terms of general trends, there was some decline and flattening in the volume of threats in August and September, though both months outpaced any month previous (except July which was the highest month for 2008 and all preceding years). The third quarter ended 338% higher than the first quarter of the year. October breaks the August/September flattening - though the month is not yet over, it's already the second highest for the year.