Australia disrupts Amadey malware control of 180,000 computers

Criminals using the Amadey malware lost control of about 180,000 infected computers after operators from the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) gained access to the malware backend and severed the connection between the controllers and the victims. The ASD described its action as disconnecting that Amadey controller from all those victims, a step it took after obtaining government approval for offensive cyber operations.

In an interview with ABC News published on 27 October, ASD’s acting deputy director-general of intelligence, Tauri Gregory, explained the approach as disabling criminal infrastructure located overseas without directly touching the compromised machines.

ASD is Australia’s foreign signals intelligence and cyber security agency, and its operations are described as requiring explicit governmental approval. The agency’s action, as reported, aimed to disrupt the criminal network by cutting the link to the compromised devices rather than malware operators, with coverage linked to reporting at LavX[.]hu.

The article attributes the specifics of the operation and the resulting control loss to ASD, ABC News, and LavX[.]hu, noting the scale of disruption to roughly 180,000 machines under Amadey’s control. The summary emphasises the governance and scope of the operation, and the reported outcome of severed command-and-control ties affecting the infected endpoints.