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The FBI Is Arresting People Who Rent DDoS Botnets (bleepingcomputer.com)
This week the FBI arrested a 26-year-old southern California man for launching a DDoS attack against online chat service Chatango at the end of 2014 and in early 2015 -- part of a new crackdown on the customers of "DDoS-for-hire" services. An anonymous reader writes:
Sean Krishanmakoto Sharma, a computer science graduate student at USC, is now facing up to 10 years in prison and/or a fine of up to $250,000. Court documents describe a service called Xtreme Stresser as "basically a Linux botnet DDoS tool," and allege that Sharma rented it for an attack on Chatango, an online chat service. "Sharma is now free on a $100,000 bail," reports Bleeping Computer, adding "As part of his bail release agreement, Sharma is banned from accessing certain sites such as HackForums and tools such as VPNs..."
"Sharma's arrest is part of a bigger operation against DDoS-for-Hire services, called Operation Tarpit," the article points out. "Coordinated by Europol, Operation Tarpit took place between December 5 and December 9, and concluded with the arrest of 34 users of DDoS-for-hire services across the globe, in countries such as Australia, Belgium, France, Hungary, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States." It grew out of an earlier investigation into a U.K.-based DDoS-for-hire service which had 400 customers who ultimately launched 603,499 DDoS attacks on 224,548 targets.
Most of the other suspects arrested were under the age of 20.
"Sharma's arrest is part of a bigger operation against DDoS-for-Hire services, called Operation Tarpit," the article points out. "Coordinated by Europol, Operation Tarpit took place between December 5 and December 9, and concluded with the arrest of 34 users of DDoS-for-hire services across the globe, in countries such as Australia, Belgium, France, Hungary, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States." It grew out of an earlier investigation into a U.K.-based DDoS-for-hire service which had 400 customers who ultimately launched 603,499 DDoS attacks on 224,548 targets.
Most of the other suspects arrested were under the age of 20.
now facing up to 10 years in prison and/or a fine of up to $250,000.
Doesn't mean he's going to get exactly that.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Busting a few users sounds like the same failure that is the War On Drugs. They should go after the purveyors of these DDoS/stresser/booter services. Check out this recent list of them, all serviced by CloudFlare in the last year. This is who they need to arrest.
alphastress.com, anonymous-stresser.net, aurastresser.com, beststresser.com, boot4free.com, booter.eu, booter.org, booter.xyz, bullstresser.com, buybooters.com, cnstresser.com, connectionstresser.com, crazyamp.me, critical-boot.com, cstress.net, cyberstresser.org, darkstresser.info, darkstresser.net, databooter.com, ddos-fighter.com, ddos-him.com, ddos.city, ddosbreak.com, ddosclub.com, ddostheworld.com, defcon.pro, destressbooter.com, destressnetworks.com, diamond-stresser.net, diebooter.com, diebooter.net, down-stresser.com, downthem.org, exitus.to, exostress.in, free-boot.xyz, freebooter4.me, freestresser.xyz, grimbooter.com, heavystresser.com, hornystress.me, iddos.net, inboot.me, instabooter.com, ipstresser.co, ipstresser.com, jitterstresser.com, k-stress.pw, layer-4.com, layer7.pw, legionboot.com, logicstresser.net, mercilesstresser.com, mystresser.com, netbreak.ec, netspoof.net, networkstresser.com, neverddos.com, nismitstresser.net, onestress.com, onestresser.net, parabooter.com, phoenixstresser.com, pineapple-stresser.com, powerstresser.com, privateroot.fr, purestress.net, quantumbooter.net, quezstresser.com, ragebooter.net, rawlayer.com, reafstresser.ga, restricted-stresser.info, routerslap.com, sharkstresser.com, signalstresser.com, silence-stresser.com, skidbooter.info, spboot.net, stormstresser.net, str3ssed.me, stressboss.net, stresser.club, stresser.in, stresser.network, stresser.ru, stresserit.com, synstress.net, titaniumbooter.net, titaniumstresser.net, topstressers.com, ts3booter.net, unseenbooter.com, vbooter.org, vdos-s.com, webbooter.com, webstresser.co, wifistruggles.com, xboot.net, xr8edstresser.com, xtreme.cc, youboot.net
If CloudFlare would stop providing bulletproof hosting for criminals and spammers, the internet would be a better place. But CloudFlare apparently loves its criminal customers and the FBI loves CloudFlare. DDoS purveyors, terrorist websites, malware distributors, CloudFlare seems to welcome them all to its hive of scum and villainy. Maybe it's time to revive the concept of the Usenet Death Penalty and apply it to all traffic to and from CloudFlare. They're the sewer of the internet and should be null routed and de-peered.
A couple of years sounds good to me. Reform, know that it's serious, and don't any of your freedom for granted. I think we're still decades away from the law and society catching up to finding the balance.
It's nice to know you've made that decision based on knowing all the facts of the case contained in a slashdot summary.
Jail is serious. Even the threat of jail can cause reform. He is facing ten years but depending on how much damage the attack actually did, they should let him plead it down to much less, especially if he's a first-time offender. Someone out early on probation who knows that they're going away for five years if they screw up can be more useful to society and more likely to reform than someone who we have to pay to keep in jail.