Hello everybody!

Almost one year ago, we posted statistics from the Secunia PSI about the state of programs installed on PCs.

We think the timing is just right for a follow up on the previous numbers - as you might have noticed, Tuesday last week (25th Nov) version 1.0 of the Secunia PSI was released. The Secunia PSI 1.0 is out after being in beta for the past 17 months - a huge thanks goes out to all 793,478 users that helped us test and improve the Secunia PSI during this period.

Over the course of the past week since we released the Secunia PSI 1.0, it has been successfully installed more than 120,000 times, thus we believe it's off to a pretty good start! - Did we mention you are most welcome to promote the PSI to family and friends ;o)

However, with this blog we're focusing on the number of insecure programs on a per PC/user basis.

About the data used in this blog entry
We have used statistics collected from NEW users of the Secunia PSI 1.0 during the last 7 days. The statistics in this blog is based on data from exactly 20,000 PCs/users.

The data used, is collected from the very first scan a user has conducted, that is, before the user has started securing their system (patching installed programs) with the Secunia PSI 1.0.

Please note. Due to the way data is collected by the Secunia PSI all results presented here are to be considered "best case" scenarios, the real numbers are likely to be worse.

There are two primary reasons as to why this should be considered "best case" data compared to data of all other Internet users:

1) The users of the Secunia PSI are likely to be more vigilant and security minded than all other Internet users.

2) We do not register if a Secunia PSI user has previously used the Secunia PSI/OSI/NSI to patch their PC, then uninstalled the Secunia PSI/OSI/NSI just to install them again (e.g. to get a clean patch history), thus the user would show up as a "first time" user in these statistics.

So back to the actual numbers; Has the "world" improved since the last look at the numbers?
The short answers is still NO - by no means. Close to all PCs continues to run with several insecure programs installed. If anything, these numbers are worse now than previously (11 months ago) when we generated these numbers initially.

The total number of PCs/users included in these numbers are 20,000, out of these 98.09% have 1 or more insecure programs installed on their PC, hence: 98 out of 100 PCs that are connected to the Internet have insecure programs installed!

By "insecure program" it is understood, that there is a newer version of the program available from the vendor that corrects one or more vulnerabilities, but the user have yet to install the secure version. A vulnerability in a program can be exploited by hackers to anything from compromising a PC, to automatically install trojans/viruses, to sniff out private information (passwords, credit cards information, etc.). And remember, your anti-virus will not protect you from the security threats of vulnerabilities in programs!

It is just as important to patch your programs against security threats, as it is to have a personal firewall and anti-virus program running!

About the Secunia PSI
The Secunia PSI is a FREE security solution from Secunia that allows private users to map, patch, and secure the programs installed on their PCs. As of December 2008, the Secunia PSI has been installed on more than 850,000 PCs worldwide.

The first beta/test version of the Secunia PSI was released July 2007, as per 25th November 2008 the Secunia PSI is out of beta/test stage and available as Secunia PSI 1.0.

Secunia's primary goal with the free Secunia PSI is to promote security patching amongst the private PC users, thus significantly heighten the overall security of home/private users. The Secunia PSI is available free-of-charge for all home/private users, without any limitations.

Join the many Secunia PSI users - download the free Secunia PSI 1.0 and secure your PC today:
http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/personal/

Contact Secunia
Should you have any questions regarding Secunia, this blog, or the services we provide please feel free to contact our support at support@secunia.com

Press inquiries can be directed to Thomas Kristensen, CTO via email tk@secunia.com or phone +45 70 20 51 44

For inquiries regarding partnerships for the Secunia PSI, please contact Mikkel Winther, PSI Partner Manager via email mwinther@secunia.com or phone +45 70 20 51 44

Stay Secure,

Jakob Balle
IT Development Manager