A gang of hackers have been sentenced to more than 13 years in prison for creating and disseminating a Trojan that stole hundreds of thousands of pounds from UK bank accounts.

The arrests mark the first time that the Metropolitan Police's Central e-Crime Unit (PCeU) has successfully worked with financial institutions and other organisations such as ISPs.

Assistant Commissioner Janet Williams, ACPO lead for e-crime, said that the collaboration should send a warning to other cyber criminals: “Due to effective partnerships with the financial industry we have successfully closed down an international criminal network and reduced the financial harm to institutions and thousands of UK victims by millions of pounds."

Azamat Rahmonov, Shohruh Fayziev, Joao Dos Santos Cruz, Paulo Jorgi and Edgar Orlando Henriques pleaded guilty at Southwark Crown Court to using a man-in-the-browser Trojan called PSP2-BBB to target UK bank customers.

More than 50 PCeU officers raided several addresses in south-east London as police closed in on the gang, one of whom, Edgar Orlando Henriques a 21-year old Venezuelan remains at large.

A recent report from RSA noted that the UK was suffering an increased number of man-in-the-browser attacks using the PSP2-BBB Trojan because as “MITB is one of the most effective tools for criminals to circumvent two-factor authentication.”