The alleged writer of a major mutation of the notorious "Panda burning joss stick" computer virus has been arrested in southwest China's Yunnan Province, local police have reported.

The virus, named "Jinzhu Baoxi", or "Golden pig announcing good news", was allegedly written by Xue Qing, of Honghe County. Xue is alleged to have made a mutation of the "Panda" virus on Feb. 14 and then spread the virus on the Internet, infecting a large number of Internet users.

Li Jun, who allegedly made the "panda burning joss stick" virus, was arrested on Thursday on a warrant from Xiantao City procuratorate in central China's Hubei Province.

The virus infects computer systems and program files and has spread through the Internet since December last year. It has infected millions of computers nationwide.

The "Panda" virus was listed as the worst computer virus last year by Chinese anti-virus company Rising. Chinese computer experts kept warning Internet users against its mutations.

Investigations into the "Golden pig" case are still underway, Honghe police said.

(Xinhua News Agency March 20, 2007)