Microsoft Helps Take Down Malware

In the past, Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit has worked individually to take down malware that threatens and executes identity fraud and financial theft across the world. On Sunday, March 25th, Microsoft announced that they had this time united with other organizations, including the Information Sharing and Analysis Center, a trade group representing over 4,000 financial institutions, and the Electronic Payments association, to take down the infamous Zeus trojan. Zeus was a particular trojan that would run in a computer's background, recording key strokes when users would enter into banking websites, and then would steal money from people's accounts using recorded key strokes. In 2010, Zeus was responsible for stealing over $10 million from U.S. and U.K. banks. Over the weekend, Microsoft and others, led the U.S. Marshals to Scranton, Penn and Lombard, Ill, where they were able to seize command-and-control servers that promoted the Zeus malware. Microsoft was also granted permission to take control of over 800 domain names used by servers to promote the malware. Microsoft announced their involvement as a part of the software giant's initiative to disrupt cybercrime infrastructure. We applaud Microsoft's efforts, and hope that all software companies will put more effort into ending cybercrime and keeping users safe.