European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation, known as Europol, announced Monday that it arrested the leader of a hacker gang that stole more than $1.2 billion from banks around the world.
The gang leader wasn’t identified by name, but was taken into custody by Spanish National Police in Alicante, following a five-year crime spree in which hackers used malware to steal from ATMs.
According to Europol, the scheme started in 2013, when the hacking group started producing the Carabank and Cobalt malware — two attacks that became notorious for targeting financial institutions.
The attackers would send spear phishing emails — targeted emails sent to employees of a bank and laced with malicious code — that would infect the victim’s machine and provide the hackers access to the bank’s computer network.
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