According to data from McAfee Avert Labs, the monitoring and research arm of security vendor McAfee, malware attacks are growing at astronomical rates and it's happening for one simple reason: the malware writers are making money.

"Cyber crime has completely altered the landscape we're dealing with today," said Dave Marcus, director, security research and communications for McAfee Avert Labs. "All the malware we're seeing today is driven 100 per cent by money, and is designed to harvest information we're going to see sold on the underground." Data from McAfee indicates 245 per cent growth in the number of malware being developed from 2006 to 2007, with a further 300 per cent growth projected from 2007 to 2008. And year to date, McAfee said the amount of malware generated has already surpassed 2006 and 2007 combined.