WannaCry security researcher arrested for alleged role in Kronos malware spread

Marcus Hutchins, the British security researcher who helped in stopping the WannaCry outbreak by discovering a hidden “kill switch” for the malware has been arrested by the FBI for his alleged role in distributing another banking malware known as Kronos.

Hutchins, also known as MalwareTechBlog on Twitter, was detained after attending the  DefCon security conference in Nevada, US, last week, Motherboard reports.

An indictment released by the US Department of Justice on Thursday says that Hutchins is accused of having helped to create, spread and maintain the banking trojan Kronos between 2014 and 2015.

The Kronos malware, which is spread through email attachments, is used to steal banking passwords from infected computers. Hutchins, who is indicted with another unnamed co-defendant, stands accused of six counts of hacking-related crimes as a result of his alleged involvement with Kronos.

Earlier this year, Hutchins, 22, played a pivotal role in containing the after-effects of the WannaCry ransomware, which caused significant damage to the UK’s National Health Service and shut down nearly 75,000 computers worldwide.