Be warned, a cabal of Russian cyber criminals is on the loose and actively pillaging vast expanses of the internet. The gang slyly assumes the administrative responsibilities of large corporate and government networks and then quickly plants malicious tools on thousands of computers in that network. Security analysts reckon this to be the most well coordinated, systematic use of administrative tools for malicious purposes.

The group’s activities came to light when Joe Stewarts of Atlanta-based computer security firm SecureWorks found that a central program belonging to the Russian bandits was running at a Wisconsin-based Internet hosting facility. He estimated that 100,000 computers had been compromised. He promptly notified a federal law enforcement agency that proceeded to boot of the central program. But the gang, unfazed, quickly relocated the tool to a network in Ukraine.

According to a report, its central program called Coreflood infects computers with spyware that logs keystrokes and screen information. This puts sensitive financial data of users at great risk. The Coreflood software running at the Wisconsin facility accrued 500GB of sensitive data, according to Stewart.

Have you had your financial information like online banking passwords stolen and subsequently misused? If the answer is yes, you have your suspects.

Image Credit: News (Australia)

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network, Software, malware, tools, russian gang, government, coporate, infections, coreflood

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