Taiwan police give virus drive as security challenge prize

Have you considered taking part in a digital security Q&A challenge and winning a virus-infected USB drive as a prize? Yes, although quite ironic, this situation really happened in Taiwan. The event was held by the country's national police, who apologized after the incident surfaced.

To make matters worse, the quiz that resulted in this real Trojan horse as a prize was held at the Taiwanese government palace and aimed precisely at highlighting the efforts of the Asian country to combat cyber crime. So far, only 20 USB sticks have been recovered by the authorities.

The malware in question was developed by the government to combat digital crime and was present in 54 of the 250 USB sticks offered as a prize. Local police said the inclusion of the virus, which could steal personal data from its users, was a mistake.

Taiwanese officials said the infected USB stick was offered as a prize by mistake.

The flash drives were made in China, but Taiwan's Criminal Investigation Department (CIB) rules out any possibility of espionage. The investigators claimed that the origin of the bug is actually a Taiwanese soil-based outsourced company, where a single employee was allegedly responsible for infecting the 54 thumb drives by mistake in an attempt to test their storage capacity.

The virus, identified as XtvSeDuA.exe, has been collecting personal data from users and sending it to a server in Poland. According to the CIB, it was used in 2015 by Europol (the European police) to dismantle a cyber fraud network.

Taiwan police give virus drive as prize in security challenge via TecMundo