Microsoft and FBI take down major botnet

Working with the FBI and authorities in 80 other countries, Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit has disrupted a major cybercrime ring. The operation has targeted 1,400 systems involved in running the Citadel botnet.

Citadel is thought to have infected as many as 5 million PCs worldwide and has been used to steal from major financial institutions including American Express, Bank of America and PayPal, accounting for losses of up to half a billion dollars to companies and individuals worldwide. The Citadel botnet is hosted using pirated versions of XP. Once the virus -- which first appeared in early 2012 -- infects a user's machine it blocks access to legitimate antivirus sites and disables installed antivirus applications making it hard to detect and remove.

Writing on the official Microsoft blog Richard Domingues Boscovich, the Assistant General Counsel of Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit says, "Like many of our past operations, this investigation once again revealed how criminals are adapting and evolving their attack methods in order to continue to infect people’s computers with malware".

He goes on to say, "This discovery showcases that, in addition to exercising safe online practices like running updated and legitimate software and using firewall and antivirus protection, people also need to use modern versions of Windows software to better prevent malware, fraud and identify theft".

For anyone who is worried that their PC may have been infected, Microsoft has additional information and free removal tools available on its support site.

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