Data published by Symantec today reveals the most
bot-infected cities and countries across the Europe, the Middle East,
and Africa (EMEA) region.
The top 10 ranking was compiled using telemetry data
gathered during 2015 from Symantec security products and includes
details about bot-infected PCs, Macs, smartphones, tablets and connected
smart devices.
Since malicious bot behavior is quite easy to pick
up thanks to a constant communications stream originating from infected
devices, Symantec had a harder time pinning down infections to each
specific country and city.
Based on the number of total bots in one specific
city, Istanbul, Turkey was the most infected city, with the largest
number of detected bots, followed by another Turkish city, Ankara, the
country’s capital.
Symantec says that these two cities accounted for
around two-thirds of Turkey’s entire bot population, with Istanbul
raking in 29 percent of all bots, and Akara with 28 percent.
The top ten is rounded up by Rome (Italy), Budapest
(Hungary), Szeged (Hungary), Moscow (Russia), Petah Tiqwa (Israel),
Madrid (Spain), Paris (France), and London (UK).
Grouping the data by country, the top ten reflected
the cities ranking, with Turkey, Italy, and Hungary “winning” the first
three spots, followed by Germany, France, Spain, the UK, Poland, Russia,
and Israel.
Taking into account the number of Internet users in
each country, and comparing this data with the number of detected bots,
we get a “bot density” factor that provides a more accurate reflection
of which countries do an appalling job at securing their computers and
connected devices.
According to bot density, the top ten is led by
Hungary, with one bot for every 393 users, followed by Monaco (1/457),
Andorra (1/591), Israel (1/809), Turkey (1/1139), Latvia (1/1240),
Kuwait (1/1373), Italy (1/1829), Cyprus (1/2283), and Poland (1/2330).
With botnets increasingly leveraged for spam and
DDoS attacks, the CERT teams of each of these countries will likely be
busy in the following months. Don’t forget to check out Symantec’s interactive EMEA Bots map.
Top ten cities by total bot population1 Istanbul, Turkey
2 Ankara, Turkey
3 Rome, Italy
4 Budapest, Hungary
5 Szeged, Hungary
6 Moscow, Russia
7 Petah Tiqwa, Israel
8 Madrid, Italy
9 Paris, France
10 London, UK
Top ten countries by total bot population
1 Turkey
2 Italy
3 Hungary
4 Germany
5 France
6 Spain
7 United Kingdom
8 Poland
9 Russia
10 Israel