What is Zeus for?

Zeus was initially designed to steal sensitive banking information. Back in 2009, Zeus attacked the computers of the Bank of America, NASA, Amazon and many other organisations, infecting an estimated 3.6 million computers that year.

The cybercriminals behind Zeus would transfer funds from the victims' accounts and send them back to themselves through intermediaries called money mules. These mules would receive the stolen funds and re-transfer them, thus disguising the final destination of the funds.

Zeus would also remotely access the machines it infected. This led to the creation of Zeus' most infamous successor, the Gameover ZeuS botnet. Botnets are often used to send spam or phishing emails, or to conduct DDoS attacks.

In 2010, the FBI successfully broke into the Zeus cybercrime ring, arresting more than 100 people in the US, UK and Ukraine. By then, the group had managed to steal over $70 million from the victims of Zeus attacks.