Saturday, February 14, 2009

Microsoft's $250,000 Reward

Microsoft is offering a $250,000 reward for the capture of a group of hackers behind a recent worm called Conficker and Downadup. And just like any other worm or virus, this one can cause some serious damage in mainly corporate networks, although it has only infected the computers and has yet to do any damage. Microsoft has released a patch, but while it fixes the computer, it can easily be infected again. So far two million Internet protocol addresses have been detected to have already been infected with the Conficker virus. And one IP address means at least one computer. So because of this, Microsoft will award anyone who gives information leading to an arrest. This is not the first time Microsoft has had to do something like this. 5 years ago, there was a worm called Sasser which caused much trouble throughout the world and when Microsoft put up the award, the person responsible was eventually tracked down in Germany and sentenced one year later.

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