Spy tool dubbed 'The Mask' undetected for seven years

A computer security software firm has uncovered what it calls the first cyberespionage campaign believed to be started by a Spanish-speaking country, targeting government agencies, energy companies and activists in 31 countries.

Dubbed "The Mask", the campaign had operated undetected since 2007 and infected more than 380 targets before it stopped last week, Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab said.

The firm declined to identify the government suspected to be behind the cyberspying, but said it had been most active in Morocco, followed by Brazil, the United Kingdom, France and Spain.

The suspected involvement of a Spanish-speaking nation is unusual as the most sophisticated cyberspying operations uncovered so far have been linked to the United States, China, Russia and Israel.

Kaspersky Lab's researchers only came across the operation because it had infected Kaspersky's own software.

"There are many super-advanced groups that we don't know about. This is the tip of the iceberg," Costin Raiu, director of Kaspersky's global research team, said.