The malware crisis is getting worse.

Malware (i.e. malicious software) refers to all kinds of harmful programs like viruses, trojans, spyware and adware that can harm your computer system.

Security software vendor Panda Security (which of course has a vested interest in hyping security threats) says that in 2008 it detected an average of 35,000 malware samples each day, 22,000 of which were new infections.

By the end of 2008, malware threats detected by Panda exceeded 15 million.

The folks at Panda say that they detected more malware in the first eight months of 2008 than in the company’s previous 17 years combined.

The majority of this new malware (67.7%) was classified as Trojans that are designed to steal confidential data such as bank accounts, passwords and the like.

Needless to say it would be prudent to use security software from Norton, McAfee, Panda and Webroot for your home and business PCs