The once explosive growth of malware on the web may be starting to slow, according to experts.

McAfee researcher Toralv Dirro said in a recent blog posting that the growth of new malware samples found in the wild has dropped, possibly providing security vendors with a "light at the end of the tunnel" in the fight against hackers.

Dirro explained that malware has proliferated at an exponential rate recently, essentially doubling year on year. This has led to dramatic upswings in the measurement of malware samples.

Recently, however, that growth has begun to slow, transforming from a dramatic exponential curve into a steady linear line in which a consistent number of new samples are being reported.

"During the past couple of months there is no longer an increase in the number of new samples added," wrote Dirro.

"The growth is no longer exponential but linear, averaging around 600,000 samples added each month."

While the idea that 600,000 new pieces of malware surface each month is hardly settling news to most users, Dirro contends that it is very encouraging news when compared to previous growth figures.

"For years the security industry has been fighting an uphill battle with the number of new samples increasing every month at an alarming rate," he explained.

"Now with constant, although still massive, growth there is some light at the end of the tunnel.

"If this trend keeps up, planning for future resources and technologies will become much easier and more manageable."