DDOS Mafia On The Loose

TivoLee writes "If you were worried that courts have been cracking down too much on Internet miscreants lately, think again. Sure, virus writers and spammers have been hit with some tough sentences in recent months. But what about this: the U.S. govt. has dropped charges against a group of four guys known as the DDOS Mafia. Two of the men admitted to releasing viruses so they could create botnets to launch DDOS attacks for hire. Their boss is accused of causing $2Mil in damage to victim sites. Yet prosecutors are dropping charges, so they can get the criminals to snitch on other criminals. Oi vey."

Comments

How much?

[Bs15]

Any idea how much they were charging for these services?

Re:Um, huh?

[Zocalo]

Indeed. I suspect the FBI are actually after bigger game since according to the article "the author of the Agobot internet worm had provided a customized version of the program to Walker, who released it to create a botnet of approximately 10,000 computers." If there is a deal on the cards, then I suspect any reducation in sentence will depend on the arrest of the Agobot author.

Uh...so what?

[JayBees]

This sort of thing happens all the time. Prosecutors are always willing to adjust or drop charges in exchange for information which would lead to big arrests for other people. Sure these guys caused $2 million in damages, but maybe the government knows these guys could help them find other people that have caused $10 million in damages, or maybe these guys could help the government find other people who are planning these attacks before these other people do $2 million or $10 million in damages.

I Am Not A Lawyer, but I've taken some criminal law classes taught by experienced attorneys, and I watch Law & Order. On the other hand, maybe there's something I'm missing.

Not only that

[Sycraft-fu]

Part of agreements like that are "and you keep your nose clean in the future." These guys will have an eye kept on them, and if they go back to their old habits not only can they be charged with the new crimes, but with the ones they made a deal on as well.

I have no problem at all with this, provided it is used to catch more important criminals. I mean really, I'm not that interested in the script kiddies that write the software and create the botnets. I want them stopped, of course, but I'm more interested in the people behind the operation that pay them and benefit from it. Bust the kiddies, the backers will find new ones, bust the backers, it's a done deal.

Hardly on the Loose

[notmikey]

Even if, in the end, all the charges are dropped, we will likely be very safe from the DDOS Mafia. Think about it: every bit of data they transmit will likely be monitored. Sure, they might try to pull a quick one past the government, but all of a sudden, at least for them, such an attempt just got much more difficult.

Re:"Oi yey"

[__aaclcg7560]

Try "oy vey" instead. See Alternative Yiddish Dictionary under "O".

Re:Oi vey? (OT)

[Anonymous Coward]

SlashDot: Jews for nerds. Stuff that's farklempt. *dodges tomatoes*

Oy vay iz mir! Don't you mean "ferklempt"? Meshugga schlemiel.

Protect Internet Anarchy

[Anonymous Coward]

In former times, the Internet used to be the place where our clowns would laugh in happy anarchy.
Corporations and Business from "real life" have since taken over the networks.
We - rightly - want the filth (organized criminality, theft, fraud, ...) those have brought with them banished from our networks.
But the ultimate outcome will be a governed Internet. Already, DRM is around the corner and internet communications are being tapped.

Protect Internet Anarchy! Suffer the occasional virii and spam mails - for the sake of a free Internet!

Re:Who are the backers?

[Sycraft-fu]

I'm not suggesting, it's the truth. Go do a bit of research on it. There are two big purchasers of botnets:

1) Spammers. They are generally more interested in the zombie'd machine version to use it to send SPAM,.

2) Extortionists. They threaten sites with DDoS's if protection money isn't paid. If that sounds like a normal mob scam, well it is and that's often who's behind it, one of the OC syndicates out there.

There are certianly script kiddies that do it just for their own benefit, but those are generally the IRC variety. They attempt to take over channels and the like. Big attacks on major sites predicated by demands for money are generally backed by criminals with a little more experience in this kind of thing.

TerrorWar

[Doc Ruby]

DDoS mafia is terrorism: threats of destruction are a media attack against groups of people, hence political. Of course the US is dropping charges against them for cooperation: we have a terrorist government, with an express policy of creating terrorists like bin Laden and the Iraqi "insurgents". With every cyberterror czar we've ever had quitting in disgust, why should we be surprised that we're consistent?

Justice

[deusexcrottsma]

Although it would be comforting to know that these guys were receiving justice from a demented cell mate named Bubba, at least be satsified with the knowledge that they probably aren't sitting around on the beach drinking mai-tais. They've already doled out thousands of dollars to a lawyer/lawyers, meaning they're going to have to buy the generic Mountain Dew for years to come. They have a potential criminal case pending, which could re-initiate at any moment if they're unable to find a replacement who can satiate their investigators. If the victim company determines that any of them is valuable enough to expend the litigation money, they have a civil case to take away their generic Mountain Dew. And as far as their livelihoods are concerned, they're probably going to have to wait at least a week or two before they can obtain a job at a reputable company.

Welcome To The Federal Justice System!

[Master of Transhuman]

"Yet prosecutors are dropping charges, so they can get the criminals to snitch on other criminals. Oi vey."

You don't know how it works, do you?

I knew a guy in the Alameda County Jail (in California) who was, like me, a Federal detainee awaiting trial. He was the chemist for a drug ring. The ring got busted; he got arrested along with the kingpins involved. The Feds threatened him with 25 years or whatever if he didn't roll over on the kingpins. He refused. Although he had no other criminal record, he was going to be charged with multiple counts totalling a lot of years in the joint. Meanwhile, the kingpins rolled over on everybody and got sentences of probation, four months, time served, etc. In other words, they rolled right out of jail and went right back to work while the one guy who was not a dealer - but who also was not a rat - got major time.

This is how the Feds get their 98% conviction rate. You are arrested, threatened with fifty years in the joint unless you rat out all your relatives and everyone else you know. Then you get only ten years in the joint. Their evidence against you is the same crap info they got from YOUR relatives in exchange for the same deal. Everybody rolls over on everybody - whether they're guilty or innocent doesn't matter.

Of course, in some case, the relatives roll over on somebody who is not a relative in order to protect their relatives. The effect is the same. I had a cellie who was an idiot who merely held stash for some dealers. When arrested, his contact told the judge he was the major player in order to protect the dealer's brother-in-law who was the real local partner in the ring. When my cellie met the head of the ring in a holding cell, the head told him he'd never heard of him but he knew of the relative. When my cellie had his lawyer bring this up to the judge, the judge said he didn't want to hear the testimony of the head man because he was "just a drug dealer" - despite the fact that my cellie had been convicted on the testimony of a lesser drug dealer with a relative to protect and a Federal deal encouraging him to rat out innocent (well, relatively innocent in my cellie's case) people.

And of course, there's the case of Kevin Mitnick and Justin Petersen...The FBI ran this one-legged crook while he took advantage of the FBI to run his own scams - eventually embarassing the FBI.

Not to mention the FBI agents in Boston and the Whitey Bulger case.

You think there's any rationality to any of this?
You've got to be kidding.

Re:Welcome To The Federal Justice System!

[Master of Transhuman]

While it's true that being a snitch is not a life-prolonging event in the Federal system, in this case, if the chemist had snitched, he'd probably have done little or no time, so it would have been irrelevant. It's unlikely he would have been harmed outside of the joint.

The point is, the Feds were unconcerned about letting a bunch of drug dealers go while they harassed some guy that was not that important. Their justification for this is always that the chemist is the irreplaceable quantity in a drug ring - but the real reason is, if you have more drug dealers on the street, you get more (re)arrests, more convictions - and more career advancement. That simple.

Cops want laws not because the laws are effective, but precisely because they are ineffective.

Laws create crime - and the state needs crime (and foreign enemies) to justify its existence and enable it to rule over the populations.