Spanish police have revealed that they have arrested three men responsible for one of the world's biggest networks of virus-infected computers. With nearly 13 million computers infected in 190 countries, it's very surprising that these 'masterminds' did not have advanced hacking skills and yet were able to inflict a world of damage.

It's not been a good start to 2010 for Google or Microsoft.

January bared witness to what is being called the ‘Google v China war’. On January 12th, Google released a blog called “a new approach to China” claiming that China had been making sophisticated computer attacks from Taiwan on U.S. businesses and Chinese Human Rights activists. Google said that it was reporting the attacks because they were concerned about freedom of speech, and is in discussion with the Chinese government regarding removal of their censorship programs it placed over its search engine at China’s request. They have also threatened to shut down Google.cn and close their offices in China, pulling out of China altogether.

After weeks of great work from writer Mark Humphries, Illustrator Simon Spilsbury and Animator Simon Deshnon - the first Backup Direct animation is ready. Here is a sneak preview of the result before it's rendered and displayed properly on the website.

It was only a few weeks ago that I talked about an expected increase in online scams this festive period as more shoppers opt to buy their presents over the internet. Well, now is the time to introduce the latest of those: The Zeus Trojan.

Have you ever found yourself happily browsing away; clicking innocently through various websites, when suddenly, you are confronted with a pop-up claiming your computer is riddled with viruses? Impossible! You claim. No matter what you select, the program continues to scan your computer, reveal a vast multitude of nasty files you had no idea where there. Then you are offered a very convenient way out of this disaster situation. An unknown 'anti-virus' program can cure it all for you. And all they need, is your credit card details.

A survey commissioned for the National Identity Fraud Prevention Week has revealed that three quarters of the workers asked felt that their respective companies could 'do more' to protect sensitive customer information.

The research also revealed that about a third of UK employees throw sensitive documents in the bin without shredding them first.

With the latest scare surrounding phishing attacks on people's free mail accounts, it has to be time that people stopped using these services for business. You won't keep a business running very long if your customer contact and private invoice details get posted all over the internet.

I came across this story earlier about a cheeky advert some malicious spammers had placed against Mozilla Firefox. It highlights the increasing sophistication of spammers.