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The FBI Is Arresting People Who Rent DDoS Botnets

16 points by Jerry2 10y ago

duskwuff 10y ago
Good. Next, they need to start going after the operators of these services. While many botnet operator claim that their sites are for "stress testing" or "security research" only, those claims are a sham -- these services have no legitimate use, and their operators are fully aware that their sites are being used to commit crimes. (And, of course, Cloudflare needs to stop serving sites that advertise DDOS-for-hire services. By protecting the operators of these sites, they have allowed them to escape detection.)
jagermo 10y ago
A little misleading headline, it is missing "... to attack other sites." But yeah, that's what the FBI is supposed to do, is it not? If people use a tool to commit a crime, you arrest them. Nobody cares if you use a service like that to test your own site.
- hawkice 10y ago
  A botnet isn't just a fancy name for a distributed system. You're hacking into people's computers and using them. The FBI might not prioritize more innocuous usages, but it's a crime either way.
- duskwuff 10y ago
  > Nobody cares if you use a service like that to test your own site. Except nobody does that. At least, nobody sane. The "tests" performed by these services are not useful for... well, actual testing. Most of them simply perform a volumetric attack against a target -- the only aspect of a site this "tests" is the capacity of its network connection, which you could find out much more easily by asking your host. The bottom line is, calling what these services do "testing" is a sham. It's an attack.
jaclaz 10y ago
>Investigators estimate that total damages caused by his attacks at over $5,000. If found guilty, Sharma faces up to ten years in prison, up to three years of supervised release, and/or a fine. Not to condone in any way the behaviour, but "up to ten years" in prison sounds to me a little bit harsh for the procured damage of US$ 5,000 or so, maybe it is a typo and the actual damages are much bigger?
- kayfox 10y ago
  News reports the maximum possible sentence for a crime, whereas the crime would be sentenced under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, so 10 years max is often 1 year for a first time offender. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Federal_Sentencing_Guidelines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Federal_Sentenci... Edit: Also see https://popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-eleventy-million-years/ https://popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-el...

16 points by Jerry2 10y ago

Good. Next, they need to start going after the operators of these services. While many botnet operator claim that their sites are for "stress testing" or "security research" only, those claims are a sham -- these services have no legitimate use, and their operators are fully aware that their sites are being used to commit crimes. (And, of course, Cloudflare needs to stop serving sites that advertise DDOS-for-hire services. By protecting the operators of these sites, they have allowed them to escape detection.)

jagermo 10y ago

A little misleading headline, it is missing "... to attack other sites." But yeah, that's what the FBI is supposed to do, is it not? If people use a tool to commit a crime, you arrest them. Nobody cares if you use a service like that to test your own site.

hawkice 10y ago
A botnet isn't just a fancy name for a distributed system. You're hacking into people's computers and using them. The FBI might not prioritize more innocuous usages, but it's a crime either way.
duskwuff 10y ago
> Nobody cares if you use a service like that to test your own site. Except nobody does that. At least, nobody sane. The "tests" performed by these services are not useful for... well, actual testing. Most of them simply perform a volumetric attack against a target -- the only aspect of a site this "tests" is the capacity of its network connection, which you could find out much more easily by asking your host. The bottom line is, calling what these services do "testing" is a sham. It's an attack.

jaclaz 10y ago

>Investigators estimate that total damages caused by his attacks at over $5,000. If found guilty, Sharma faces up to ten years in prison, up to three years of supervised release, and/or a fine. Not to condone in any way the behaviour, but "up to ten years" in prison sounds to me a little bit harsh for the procured damage of US$ 5,000 or so, maybe it is a typo and the actual damages are much bigger?

kayfox 10y ago
News reports the maximum possible sentence for a crime, whereas the crime would be sentenced under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, so 10 years max is often 1 year for a first time offender. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Federal_Sentencing_Guidelines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Federal_Sentenci... Edit: Also see https://popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-eleventy-million-years/ https://popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentence-el...