Beijing, Feb.8 : China has shut down the country's biggest hacker training site in Central Hubei province.

Local media and China Daily reported that three people, who ran the Black Hawk Safety Net, and were suspected of offering others online attacking programs and software, a crime recently added to the Criminal Law, had been arrested during the raid on the training site.

Chinese Police confirmed that 1.7 million Yuan (249,000 dollars) in assets had been seized and frozen.

The provincial public security department of Hubei said the closure of the website had its roots in a previous Web attack and virus dissemination case in the city of Macheng in 2007, when police found some of the suspects caught were members of Black Hawk Safety Net.

Hubei province named Black Hawk Safety Net as the largest hacker-training site in China, which openly recruited members and disseminated hacker techniques through lessons, Trojan software and online forum communications.

Since it was established in 2005, the site had recruited more than 12,000 VIP members and collected over seven million Yuan in membership fees. More than 170,000 people registered for free membership.

Police said more than 50 officers had been investigating the case.

According to a report released by the National Computer Network Emergency Response Coordination Center of China, China's hacker industry caused losses of 7.6 billion Yuan in 2009.