Microsoft released its Security Intelligence Report today, giving insights into the way viruses, malware and other threats are trending.

The bad news: Malware and other unwanted shite removed from computers grew 43% (and no this didn’t include the copies of Vista that were removed and downgraded to XP <g>).

The medium news: Attacks are moving to the application layer, with only 10% of vulnerabilities being reported at the operating system level.

The good news: Microsoft vulnerabilities are down 33% this year over last year (more specifically: when comparing first half 2008 to second half 2007).

More details on the Malware Protection Center portal. Download the full 150 page report here, complete with pretty pictures like this:

Microsoft is clearly taking security very seriously (they’ve been telling us such for the last decade) and finally seeing some seeing some fruits of their labours.