We recently published the 2007 statistics based on the data collected by Zone-H. One of the most interesting fact is the sharp decrease (-37%) of the attacks compared to the attacks reported the previous year.  In fact, while in year 2006 we filed 752,361 attacks, in year 2007 the reported attacks were "only" 480,905. Since the end of the 90s, when the first mirror archives (Alldas, Safemode, Attrition) started to track website defacements, this is the first time ever that the trend is showing a negative figure.

Usually from year to year, we were used to see an average increment of about 30% (in year 2005 the reported attacks were 493,840).

Is this a good news or a bad news? Certainly website defacements are loosing popularity. A few years ago a Microsoft defacement would have hit  the news, today there's no more hype among journalists in reporting such fact. We just got used to it, period.
The interesting question is: if the Internet user-base is getting larger and larger and if the systems are getting weaker  and weaker, why the website defacements are decreasing by strong  figures?

We do have an answer and to explain it to you we have to go back with our memories in year 2005...

Originally posted on Sunnet Beskerming' site, then Slashdotted, then was reported also by The Register 

The team at Zone-H is currently questioning the merit of continuing to update and maintain their well known defacement archive service given the negative sentiment directed at them that many people express when they find out that they have been compromised and the discouraging trend of site defacers using the archive as an informal ranking board, with some striving for the highest number of defacements recorded in the archive.

Having become the leading archive of defaced sites following the demise of the Alldas archive (the Zone-H archive is now more than 200 times larger than Alldas was at its peak), Zone-H has become a valuable resource for Information Security, even more valuable when the numerous other services that the company offers are considered. However, the continuation of the archive isn't the only problem that Zone-H has had to face in recent months, with the arrest of their founder, Roberto Preatoni in relation to an Italian spying scandal.

Bain and Huawei's  $2,2bn  first attempt  to buy out 3Com has been amended with a second offer, under which the Chinese networking giant and the Investment Fund plan to gain control of the American networking giant, but having "limited access" to 3com's security products. This amendment has been introduced after the Treasury's Committee on Foreign Investments launched an investigation aimed to block the deal, fearing possible implications in having a Chinese company so much close to key security products, currently used by the American government's IT infrastructures. Further skepticism was raised by those who didn't forget that Huawei's founder Mr. Ren Zhengfei was also a former Chinese People Liberation Army officer...