Scotland Yard warns of terrorist activity behind virus locking users' computers, ransom demands

London, April 24 (ANI): Scotland Yard has warned that police have detected paedophile or terrorist activity as being behind a virus that locks users of their computers and demands a 100-pound fine.

The scam is believed to come from Scotland Yard's specialist cyber crime officers, the Police Central e-Crime Unit, The Telegraph reports.

"The virus cause the PC to freeze and lock," a Met Police spokesman said.

"Genuine law enforcement agencies would never contact members of the public via this method and demand funds in this way," the spokesman added.

He said that officers were working on an international investigation of the virus that was lead by German authorities, which have discovered the most victims.

The message that appeared on infected machines was designed to scare victims to paying the 'fine' through difficult-to-trace online payment methods.

Forbidden websites such as child pornography were visited from this IP address.

Security firm F-Secure said that thousands of web users have been affected by the virus in 13 countries since March.

The chief research officer of F-Secure, Mikko Hypponen, has said that most computers became infected as they did not keep their browser add-ons up-to-date.

"The infection is invisible to the end user until the user reboots the computer," he added.

However, the Met has asked people those affected should pay any money or bank details in an effort to unlock their computer. (ANI)