The Spanish Civil Guard has arrested three men behind one of the biggest botnets in recent history, which infected 13 million computers with software designed to steal private data such as credit card numbers.
The Mariposa botnet had infected computers in 190 countries, with organisations such as schools, government agencies and major corporate affected.
It is not yet known how much money has been stolen as part of the botnet, but some experts have said removing the programs from various machines could cost millions.
The program was designed to take control of infected machines, record keystrokes and use login details to steal cash and other private data, which was sent to a type of control centre.
The virus was spread using vulnerabilities within Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
COMMENTS
SmartCompany is committed to hosting lively discussions. Help us keep the conversation useful, interesting and welcoming. We aim to publish comments quickly in the interest of promoting robust conversation, but we’re a small team and we deploy filters to protect against legal risk. Occasionally your comment may be held up while it is being reviewed, but we’re working as fast as we can to keep the conversation rolling.
The SmartCompany comment section is members-only content. Please subscribe to leave a comment.
The SmartCompany comment section is members-only content. Please login to leave a comment.