Great News For Your Thursday.. Maybe.
Police in the U.K. have arrested 19 individuals believed to be part of an organized cybercrime network that used the Zeus trojan to steal six million pounds ($9.5 million) from U.K. bank accounts (in just three months).
“Security experts consider Zeus, also known as Zbot, the most prevalent financial malware on the Internet today. Often foisted via social engineering ruses, the Trojan typically is designed to steal bank account information from its victims.”
ZeuS?
“First identified in 2007, Zeus remains active and, just this week, has been leveraged in mobile device attacks to steal codes used to authenticate banking transactions and in email campaigns masquerading as LinkedIn invites.”
“Mobile device” = your smartphone. (Does your cellular have an antivirus?)
To read more about these arrests, click here.
“Unfortunately, this is only the tip of the cybercrime iceberg,”
Yes folks. That’s true. Those arrested were probably just members of one ‘cell’ of those behind ZueS/Zbot. And the UK is not the only place it’s employed.
And ZueS/Zbot is just one of thousands of Trojans you chance when you surf the Web.
Concerned? There are several things a PC owner should do to have a healthy, smooth-running computer, and be safer from cyber-criminals when they browse the Internet. If you surf the “web”, please read A Checklist For Computer Ownership.
Folks, our devices, and the Internet itself, were not built (originally) with security in mind. Nor can an antivirus or “security suite” stop people from clicking on dangerous things nor opening spam. It is up to us, Dear Reader, to exercise what I call “paranoid common sense” – and learn about these dangers and take preventative actions. You don’t have to be a victim.
“We believe we have disrupted a highly organized criminal network, which has used sophisticated methods to siphon large amounts of cash from many innocent peoples’ accounts, causing immense personal anxiety and significant financial harm — which of course banks have had to repay at considerable cost to the economy,”
Yes.. the economy.. being bled millions a month.. billions a year.. Maybe something should be done? (It starts with you.)
Copyright 2007-2010 © “Tech Paul” (Paul Eckstrom). All Rights Reserved. 
post to jaanix.
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• About Tech Paul
I am a Retired computer & network technician. I used to think the machines were pretty cool. Now I don’t.
They’re anything but.
I regularly posted how-to’s and tricks & tips and general computing advice here starting in 2007. (Use the Search tool to find answers. But be aware, many are rather dated.) Sometimes I answered (your) specific questions in an article if I believed the answer was generally helpful to “everyone”. All the writing you see was my own, typos and all. There always is/was an implied “IMHO” in what you see here.
Note: You are responsible for using this blog and its content. I am in no way liable for any losses caused by user error, viruses and/or other malware, hardware or software failure, or any other conceivable reason.
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