Thousands of websites, including ones run by United States and British government agencies, were infected for several hours on Sunday with code that causes web browsers to secretly mine digital currencies, technology news site The Register reported. The news comes amid a surge in cyber attacks using software that forces infected computers to mine crypto currencies on behalf of hackers. The tainted version of Browsealoud caused inserted software for mining the digital currency Monero to run on computers that visited infected sites, generating money for the hackers behind the attack, The Register said. Representatives of the U.S. and British law enforcement agencies and Texthelp could not immediately be reached for comment. Texthelp told The Register that it had shut down the operation by disabling Browsealoud while its engineering team investigated.

Source: The Star February 11, 2018 23:03 UTC