More Consumer Reports: Viruses and Spyware Cost Users $7.8 Billion

["Fergie" <fergdawg () netzero net>]

Via Newsfactor.

[snip]

Consumers paid as much $7.8 billion over two years to repair or replace
computers that got infected with viruses and spyware, a Consumer
Reports survey found.

That figure was down from a similar survey a year ago. Still, it
suggests that people are paying large sums to cope with the flood of
malicious viruses and other programs that can slow computers or render
them inoperable.

"There is a very high national cost to this," said Jeff Fox, technology
editor of the consumer magazine. "People think they're invincible, even
when this kind of money is involved."

In a nationwide survey, the magazine found that unwanted commercial
e-mail, known as spam, is the biggest computer-security problem. But
viruses are the most expensive, with people paying $5.2 billion in 2004
and 2005 to repair or replace afflicted machines, the survey found.

[snip]

More:
http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=45613

- ferg


--
"Fergie", a.k.a. Paul Ferguson
 Engineering Architecture for the Internet
 fergdawg(at)netzero.net
 ferg's tech blog: http://fergdawg.blogspot.com/


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