See global cyberthreats mapped in real time

IT security vendor Kasperksy Lab has released a real-time interactive map of online malware threats, and it ain't pretty (well the brightly colored "War Games"-style digital image is, but the magnitude of the problem isn't).

You spin the 3D globe using a mouse and zoom in or out with a scroll wheel. Click on a country, and you'll see the number and type of threats detected there since 12 a.m. GMT and the position that nation holds on the world's "most-infected" list. (The US showed up at No. 3 at the time of this writing, with Russia and India holding the first and second slots, respectively; the rankings shift depending on the time of day, however.)

Different types of threats tracked by the Kaspersky Antivirus and Internet Security Multi Device software shoot around the map like colored lasers. Viruses found in email appear as orange, for example, and yellow represents malicious executable files.

It should be noted that an "Am I Infected?" button on the map leads to a download page for Kaspersky Security Scan software. But whether or not you choose Kaspersky products for your malware-battling needs, the mesmerizing map serves as a reminder that online threats are very real -- and sometimes look a lot like the classic Defcon video game.You can even share statistics across social-media platforms (tweeters in Greenland and Antactica might want to brag about being way down in the No. 236 and No. 245 spots).

Now if someone would just do a mashup of the Twitter map that tracks curses in real time and the Kaspersky map that tracks malware in real time, F-bomb tweets about online threats would probably go way up.

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