[MSN] U.S. authorities and their European partners have dismantled a massive malware network that has been used by prolific ransomware groups to extort tens of millions of dollars from victims worldwide.The Justice Department said Tuesday that the FBI has gained access to more than 700,000 computers throughout the world, including 200,000 in the United States, that have been infected with the Qakbot malicious software and was in the process of removing it from victimized devices.
U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada for the Central District of California described Qakbot during a press conference Tuesday as "one of the most notorious and pernicious botnets in the world" and the law enforcement effort that took it down as the "most significant technological and financial operation ever led by the Department of Justice against a botnet."
First detected in 2008, Qakbot was malicious software that infected computers worldwide. An unnamed cybercriminal organization then sold access to this botnet to other criminal organizations, who would use it coerce funds from their victims via ransom for either access to information on their infected computers or to prevent such information from being publicly distributed.
Estrada told reporters that Qakbot was "the botnet of choice" for cybergangs and that they have evidence of it being used in some 40 different ransomeware attacks that have cost governments and businesses roughly $58 million in the last 18 months alone.
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