iPhone Worm Was Simple, Yet Effective, Analysis Shows

The iKee worm that was infecting jailbroken iPhones last month was a simple, yet effective, piece of software that shows how easy it might be for an attacker to create a fairly large, functioning botnet comprising mobile devices, an analysis of the worm shows. Researchers at SRI International’s...

On the Hunt for Conficker

There are several ongoing investigations attempting to find the authors of the Conficker botnet, one of the fastest spreading worms in history, but those responsible for the worm have proven elusive. Read the full article. TechTarget...

ID Theft Gang Using Amazon's EC2 as Command and Control Server

Security researchers have intercepted a new variant of the Zeus crimeware using Amazon’s EC2 services to command and control the botnet. The cybercriminals appear to be using Amazon’s RDS managed database hosting service as a backend alternative in case they lose access to the original domain,...

Germany to Fight Botnets with ISPs

In the first half of next year the German government plans to set up an advisory center which will help users purge their computers of viruses and bots. Read the full article. The H Security...

Jose Nazario on Botnets and the History of DDoS Attacks

Dennis Fisher talks with Jose Nazario of Arbor Networks about the Mafiaboy attacks, the history of DDoS attacks and the botnet epidemic. Podcast audio courtesy of sykboy65 Subscribe to the Digital Underground podcast on...

Mafiaboy, Botnets and You

The botnet problem has grown to epidemic proportions, and in this video Threatpost editor Dennis Fisher talks about the roots of the problem and how it evolved into one of the larger threats on the Web...

Koobface Stocking Stuffer Malware

The Koobface botnet, one of the most efficient social engineering driven botnets, is entering the Xmas season with a newly introduced template spoofing a YouTube video page, in between enticing the visitor into installing a bogus Adobe Flash Player Update New Koobface campaign spoofs Adobe’s Flas...

The Root of the Botnet Epidemic

Over the course of a few days in February 2000, a lone hacker was able to bring some of the Web’s larger sites to their knees, using just a few dozen machines and some relatively primitive software to cripple Yahoo, eBay, Etrade, Amazon, ZDnet and others for hours at a time. No one knew it at the...

Tips for Diminishing Botnet Attacks

Online, the biggest battle these days is against botnets: networks of infected computers which hackers can use — unbeknownst to the machine’s owner — for online crimes including sending out spam or launching a denial of service attack. The black-hat techniques employed to snare users into a botne...

SEO Scareware Campaign Compromises 200K Websites

Security researchers have detected a massive blackhat SEO search engine optimization campaign consisting of over 200,000 compromised web sites, all redirecting to fake security software Inst58s6.exe, commonly referred to as scareware. The massive blackat SEO campaign has been launched by the same...

An Inside Look at Botnet Chasers

They’re the Internet equivalent of storm chasers, spending endless hours scanning and sleuthing, looking for the telltale signs of botnets. Here’s an inside look at the battle against cybercrime’s weapons of mass infection. Read the full article. CSOonline.com...

Gaming Botnet Bleeds Over To The Enterprise

Botnets come in all shapes and sizes and if you can’t find one that fits your unique purposes off-the-rack, it’s trivial to create a custom one using a do-it-yourself construction kit – which helps to explain the diversity we’re seeing within the enterprise. In general though, enterprise-targeted...

The Debate Over Naming Botnets

The security industry lacks a uniform way to title botnets, and the result is sometimes a long list of names for the same botnet that are used by different antivirus vendors and that can be confusing to customers. As it stands now, the infamous Conficker is also known as Downup, Downadup and Kido...

Malicious Google AppEngine Used to Control Botnet

Arbor Networks researcher Jose Nazario has spotted a malicious Google AppEngine application being used to control a botnet of infected computers. The Google App Engine is feeding URLs to the zombies hijacked machines for them to download, Nazario explained. Read the full blog post arbornetworks.c...

How to Take Down a Botnet

The botnet problem has reached epidemic levels in recent months, with the continued growth of large-scale botnets, as well as the identification of smaller, more targeted networks around the world. But researchers have been taking steps to disrupt botnets of late, with some notable successes, as...

Spam Botnet Gaining Traction

Upping its output of spam by nearly 5 percent in recent weeks, a new botnet called Festi has grabbed the attention of researchers, cracking the list of top 10 most prolific spamming botnets. The botnet has apparently pumped up the volume of spam by recruiting more bots, about 60 percent of which...

Where Are We A Year After McColo Shutdown?

In the year since the shutdown of notorious Web hosting firm McColo, spammers are growing strong. Part of this is the result of improvements by botnet operators. Like anyone who is successful what they do, the people controlling the most powerful botnets in cyber-space learn from their mistakes...

Update Protection against Recent Malware Threats (2-Nov-09)

The update includes new protections against 10 recent malware threats: Botnet: Backdoor.Win32.Httpbot.yiTrojan: Packed.Win32.Krap.wTrickler: Trojan.Win32.Agent2.kxuTrickler: Trojan-Downloader.Win32.Pher.ijTrickler: Trojan-Downloader.Win32.SillyFDC-DSWorm: W32.FnumbotWorm:...

Facebook Password-Reset Spam is Botnet Attack

Virus hunters are raising the alarm for a large-scale spam attack that uses fake Facebook password-reset messages to trick PC users into downloading a dangerous piece of malware. The malicious executable is linked to the Bredolab botnet, which has been linked to massive spam runs and identity-the...

Botnet-Infected Computers Powering Click Fraud

According to new data from ClickForensics, botnet-infected computers are behind the majority of click-fraud attacks against advertisers and publishers. For the third quarter this year, about 43 percent of all fraudulent clicks came from computers within botnets. The figure is the highest in four...