According to the January top 10 IT security threats from BitDefender, the Conficker worm dropped significantly in terms of its infections during January.
The IT security vendor's latest threats report claims to show that Win32.Worm.Downadup.Gen has dropped from first to third place. Most notably of all, however, the report shows the threat is completely absent from the regional top ten for the UK.
Alexandru Catalin Cosoi, head of the vendor's online threats lab, said that Conficker has been one the most high-profile threats of recent years, with many variants.
"The damage it can cause varies from exploiting weak passwords to blocking access to security vendor websites", he said.
"However, it seems that a combination of migration away from the Windows XP OS and better awareness amongst users means it is no longer as widespread as it once was. Of course, people still need to remain vigilant and make sure their computers are fully protected to avoid infection", he added.
According to Cosoi and his team's report, the gap created by Conficker has been partly filled by a newcomer - Trojan.Crack.I.
This apparently harmless keygen, says the report, installs a trojan that collects various details about other applications on the compromised computer, as well as to install a backdoor service that allows remote access to the infected system.
Its emergence, says BitDefender, to second place on the threat report is an indicator of the fact that the worldwide software landscape is affected by piracy and the subsequent threats posed by this practice.