Africa: The 2nd Safest Continent to Surf the Web
Here’s an interesting study by AVG on internet security, asking “Where in the World are you most likely to be hit by a malicious computer attack or virus?”.
Apparently, and surprisingly to me, the answer is “not Africa” or South America.
“During the last week of July, AVG researchers compiled a list of virus and malware attacks by country picked up by AVG security software. This means we have compiled data from over 127 million computers in 144 countries to determine the incidence rates of virus attacks by country.”
Dirk Singer, of AVG sent over the list of African countries, here they are country-by-country. As you can see, sub-saharan Africa is compatively ‘safe’ compared to other areas of the World. Your chances of being attacked while surfing the web in each country are:
North Africa
- Egypt 1 in 62.4
- Algeria 1 in 86.9
- Libya 1 in 87.7
- Mauritania 1 in 92.4
- Tunisia 1 in 110.7
- Morocco 1 in 112.1
Sub-Saharan Africa
- Mali 1 in 49.9
- Sudan 1 in 53.9
- Nigeria 1 in 67.5
- Benin 1 in 76.6
- Ghana 1 in 99.4
- Ivory Coast 1 in 101.5
- Gabon 1 in 113.1
- Angola 1 in 129.7
- Botswana 1 in 134.4
- Ethiopia 1 in 135.8
- Senegal 1 in 140.6
- Uganda 1 in 153.6
- Liberia 1 in 153.8
- Burkina Faso 1 in 163.4
- South Africa 1 in 172.3
- Tanzania 1 in 180.6
- Kenya 1 in 216.1
- Zambia 1 in 262.2
- Mozambique 1 in 263.8
- Zambia 1 in 262.2
- Namibia 1 in 353.1
- Togo 1 in 359.4
- Niger 1 in 442.0
- Sierra Leone 1 in 696.0
Keep in mind, this was over one week and it also doesn’t point directly towards where the attacks are originating from. Interesting data though, and not what I would have expected to see.
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
I bet the riskiest countries also have the biggest penetration of pirated software.
This data is based on “a list of virus and malware attacks by country picked up by AVG security software” which begs the question, what about the viruses & malware NOT picked up? In my experience, some of the worst attacks have come from these”safer” countries precisely because they evade the anti-virus software and their definition files. There likely is a large piece of the picture missing…
There is also one very important fact about this data. It is based on the penetration of the AVG software in the various countries. I for one am running an anti-virus software, but it ain’t AVG, so I don’t feature in the stats
I don’t use them either, but they do have enough penetration (look at their overall numbers) to have a pretty good understanding of the overall threat environment.
The thing is, majority rules, so in this case the most and fastest internet users are not based in Africa. For example, why would anyone try and use 54kbs connections to launch a DOS, for example, when he can get users on well over 1mbps?
[...] WhiteAfrican.comというサイトで“Africa: The 2nd Safest Continent to Surf the Web”という面白い記事を発見したのでご紹介。 [...]
Morgyle n James, just nitpicking to throw doubt at the stats. Unless u can offer alternative facts/stats, dont bother with ur prejudice.!
@Crazywizard – just an opinion, not a prejudice. There are always many variables that can affect the origin of statistical data, not least how the data is interpreted. Warranted we are only seeing a small sample here, becuase as of the 30 June 2010 there are estimated to be 1,966,514,816
Internet users (http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm). That means AVG only provided stats on 6% of the Worlds Internet population over the given timespan of 1 week
I’m so excited that paypal now supports send and receive money in Kenya. This is great news for all Kenyans especially the e-commerce websites It also proves that kenyan is indeed safe place inters of cyber universe
Paypal in Africa: Kenya users can now receive money…
The big P of e-commerce, now offers more service to residents of Kenya. Paypal users in Kenya can now receive money via PayPal, and withdraw same to a US bank account if they have one. Though users in Kenya cannot yet withdraw to a local bank account, …
Leave a Comment