One of the world’s largest hackarnätverk uncovered – controlled 500 000 pcs … – Computer Sweden

U.s. and european authorities have jointly cracked a hackarnätverk that eluded them since 2009. Yesterday they announced that five people have been arrested suspected of involvement.

the 39 servers have been seized and a further 221 has been disconnected from the internet and notifications have been sent to the web host where they are found, according to Europol.

the Avalanche, who the network called, has spread over 20 different types of malicious code, among other things, a banker trojan, Goznym, such as stealing user credentials, and a notorious ransomware Teslacrypt, reports IDG News.

also Read: Great “wage dispersion” among cyber criminals – so much do they gain in their crimes

Two of the servers have been seized in the Stockholm area, ” says Anders Ahlqvist, at the National centre for cyber-crime with the Police, to SVT News.

Now examine the Swedish police on the servers leads to an investigation in Sweden or if it should be sent on to the German police.

It has taken the authorities four years of investigation in over 40 different countries to succeed in shutting down the Avalanche, according to the u.s. department of justice.

Investigators have made use of something they call a slukhålsmetod, sinkholing, which means that the infiltrates the nätkriminellas datorinfrastruktur and interfere with their activities. Among other things, it involves a redirection of internetrafiken from the infected computers to servers controlled by the authorities.

this type of method has never before been used in such a large scale, according to Europol. And investigators say that the botnet that the network had control over is one of the largest known in the world.

also Read: Deadly hack – researchers took control of the pacemakers

Through its botnet sent the network over a million nätfiskemejl with infected attachments or links each week, and users in over 180 countries got infected.

According to the british National Crime Agency, which investigates organised crime has a criminal paid for to gain access to the network and able to choose the different services that the infected code, ransomware or nätfiskekampanjer.

The british police also urge users to scan their computers with different free tool to clean remove any infections from the Avalanche.