Developer of BrickerBot Malware Claims He Destroyed Over Two Million Devices (bleepingcomputer.com)

An anonymous reader writes: In an interview today, the author of BrickerBot, a malware that bricks IoT and networking devices, claimed he destroyed over 2 million devices, but he never intended to do so in the first place. His intentions were to fight the rising number of IoT botnets that were used to launch DDoS attacks last year, such as Gafgyt and Mirai. He says he created BrickerBot with 84 routines that try to secure devices so they can't be taken over by Mirai and other malware. Nevertheless, he realized that some devices are so badly designed that he could never protect them. He says that for these, he created a "Plan B," which meant deleting the device's storage, effectively bricking the device. His identity was revealed after a reporter received an anonymous tip about a HackForum users claiming he was destroying IoT devices since last November, just after BrickerBot appeared. When contacted, BrickerBot's author revealed that the malware is a personal project which he calls "Internet Chemotherapy" and he's "the doctor" who will kill all the cancerous unsecured IoT devices.

Comments

There is a time for everything.

[Gravis Zero]

I guess it is time.

Re:He'll get 27 years in jail

[monkeyzoo]

Definitely righteous work:

1) Protecting individuals and society from the harms of shoddy IOT devices. Would you rather have your cheap IOT device fail and realize something is wrong with it or have it become an entry point for stealing critical data from your network or infecting your important devices with ransomware? At least if your device breaks, you realize something is wrong with it and can complain to the manufacturer for a refund instead of it spying on you and/or serving as a node in a criminal's botnet. The greater good is served in any case by society as a whole being protected from weaponized IOT devices.

2) Creating economic imperatives for the companies producing them to design in security. The immediate impact of brickerbot would hopefully be that companies face immediate PR blowback that kills sales when they release shoddy devices that are vulnerable. And over time such products that suffer widespread vulnerabilites to brickage will be tarnished by consumers on the marketplace, and the manufacturers will learn that to make any money they need to pay attention to implementing security precautions.