US and UK Zombies Demand Top Dollar

coondoggie writes "Denizens of the malware underworld who sell access to compromised computers do so at varying rates depending on where the machines are located, researchers told the Usenix Security Symposium this week. The researchers followed what they called the pay-per-install (PPI) industry, which obtains infected machines from which malware can be launched and sells access to these machines to parties looking for someplace to execute malicious code. Sometimes the PPI sellers hire middlemen to supply the compromised machines, and the PPI dealer retails them."

Comments

Re:Folks, the writing is on the wall

[WrongSizeGlass]

It's plain as day. WE NEED COMMUNISM NOW! You'd have to be blind not to see it.

Communist zombies? Those are slated for the sequel. Everyone knows you never put communist zombies in the first release.

Zombies, feh

[Jay Maynard]

There's nothing wrong with a zombie that a Remington 870 can't fix...be it computer or ex-human.

Re:So?

[Lieutenant_Dan]

Valid points; from my own experience you will also find that client systems from US/Canada/UK? are considered "trusted". With all the junk going out there in the world, a few places are putting in geolocating in there, either blocking users, asking for a second factor, or just scrutinizing their access. It does reduce some of the noise.

Of course proxies, TOR, AOL users, etc, negate some of that but when you had a breach or want to justify your department, you'll do certain things. You take care of the unsophisticated and script kiddy stuff out of the equation.

I'm not saying it's good or bad, I'm just saying.

Re:Honest question

[Hatta]

You cannot prove that your computer is not a zombie. Consider the classic Reflections on Trusting Trust by Ken Thompson.

Re:Folks, the writing is on the wall

[Nidi62]

Have you noticed how every attempt towards the "radiant future" has involved the mass starvation and murder of millions of people within the country at the hands of a government that is supposedly the "people's" government? And that "class struggle" was only ended by making everyone in the state poor, with the exception of those directly serving the state in some oppressive capacity by making them only slightly less poor; while at the same time those leading the state make themselves rich and corrupt to levels Nero could only have dreamed about? Yes, Communism promises to make everyone equal. But it is not brought about upon the back of the people, but rather on their corpses.