International police disrupted the "world's most dangerous" cyber-crime service used to break into computer systems, law agencies announced on Wednesday.
The illicit service, called Emotet, was operated as a so-called botnet, software that infects a network of computers and allows them to be controlled remotely, Europol and its judicial sister agency Eurojust said.
Police in Britain, Canada, Germany, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Ukraine and the US teamed up to infiltrate Emotet's infrastructure.
"Law enforcement and judicial authorities worldwide this week disrupted one of the most significant botnets of the past decade, Emotet," Europol said.
The network involved several hundred servers around the world that were used to "manage the computers of the infected victims, to spread to new ones, to serve other criminal groups", the agency said.
"Investigators have now taken control of its infrastructure in an international co-ordinated action."
Emotet was offered for hire to other top-level criminals who then used it as door opener to install other types of malware, making it especially dangerous, Europol said.
This included infamous Trojans that steal bank details and credentials, and ransomware that locks files and systems and holds them for ransom for large sums of money.
Criminals use email attachments to trick unsuspecting victims into opening the mails, making them look like invoices, shipping notices and information about Covid-19.
All of these emails contained Word documents attached to the email or downloadable by clicking on a link within.
When a user opened one of these documents, they were prompted to "enable macros" so that the malicious code hidden in the Word file could run and install Emotet malware on a victim's computer.
"Emotet was one of the biggest vectors of corporate infection in ransomware and data theft attacks," Gerome Billois, a Paris cybersecurity expert for the consultancy Wavestone, told AFP.
The police action "shows that it is possible to stop cyber criminals", Mr Billois said.
What is graphene?
Graphene is extracted from graphite and is made up of pure carbon.
It is 200 times more resistant than steel and five times lighter than aluminum.
It conducts electricity better than any other material at room temperature.
It is thought that graphene could boost the useful life of batteries by 10 per cent.
Graphene can also detect cancer cells in the early stages of the disease.
The material was first discovered when Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov were 'playing' with graphite at the University of Manchester in 2004.
Results
Stage 7:
1. Caleb Ewan (AUS) Lotto Soudal - 3:18:29
2. Sam Bennett (IRL) Deceuninck-QuickStep - same time
3. Phil Bauhaus (GER) Bahrain Victorious
4. Michael Morkov (DEN) Deceuninck-QuickStep
5. Cees Bol (NED) Team DSM
General Classification:
1. Tadej Pogacar (SLO) UAE Team Emirates - 24:00:28
2. Adam Yates (GBR) Ineos Grenadiers - 0:00:35
3. Joao Almeida (POR) Deceuninck-QuickStep - 0:01:02
4. Chris Harper (AUS) Jumbo-Visma - 0:01:42
5. Neilson Powless (USA) EF Education-Nippo - 0:01:45
Labour dispute
The insured employee may still file an ILOE claim even if a labour dispute is ongoing post termination, but the insurer may suspend or reject payment, until the courts resolve the dispute, especially if the reason for termination is contested. The outcome of the labour court proceedings can directly affect eligibility.
- Abdullah Ishnaneh, Partner, BSA Law
Normcore explained
Something of a fashion anomaly, normcore is essentially a celebration of the unremarkable. The term was first popularised by an article in New York magazine in 2014 and has been dubbed “ugly”, “bland’ and "anti-style" by fashion writers. It’s hallmarks are comfort, a lack of pretentiousness and neutrality – it is a trend for those who would rather not stand out from the crowd. For the most part, the style is unisex, favouring loose silhouettes, thrift-shop threads, baseball caps and boyish trainers. It is important to note that normcore is not synonymous with cheapness or low quality; there are high-fashion brands, including Parisian label Vetements, that specialise in this style. Embraced by fashion-forward street-style stars around the globe, it’s uptake in the UAE has been relatively slow.
