The threat from malicious Internet worms is about to explode exponentially, a security expert said Thursday as he predicted release of an especially menacing "super worm" in the near future.

"The next super worm is about to hit," said Scott Chasin, chief technology officer at message filtering firm MX Logic and creator of the well-known security discussion group Bugtraq.

The next generation of mass-mailed worms will be even more dangerous than the current malware that plagues businesses and consumers, Chasin warned. Instead of relying on embedded SMTP engines to propagate from one machine to another, the newest threats will use their own peer-to-peer networking technology to not only proliferate but also to communicate with systems infected with other worms, creating a so-called "super worm" that could continue to mutate almost indefinitely.

By Gregg Keizer at Yahoo! News.

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