Micro Bill Systems

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article needs additional citations for verification.
Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (May 2008)

Micro Bill Systems (also known as MicroBillSys, MBS or Microbillsystems) is a Trojan horse that hides its presence on the compromised computer, embedding itself into the start menu. It generally presents the user with a fictitious bill for the use of web services, often adult content sites. The bill generally opens as an extra window, which is locked for a short while, and therefore impossible to close until the lock expires. Customers are invited to call a freephone number in order to unlock the bill, but can end up paying a sizeable charge should they follow this route.

It is regarded as a low risk virus, but its nature can be frustrating for the user because the window cannot even be minimised while locked, and it therefore prevents the user from browsing the Internet during this period. Expensive specialist anti-virus software was initially required to remove it, but freeware is now available online.

[edit] Micro Bill Systems Ltd

The pop-up software which appears on screen is operated by a company named Micro Bill Systems Ltd. In the UK, there have been several complaints about this company to the Office of Fair Trading, and this resulted in a ruling by the OFT in March 2008 requiring Micro Bill Systems to act to limit the amount of disruption which can be caused by its software.