International internet investigation nets arrest27 March 2006
International internet investigation nets arrest
Thefirst successful joint investigation into botnets inAustralia by the Australian High Tech Crime Centre (AHTCC),the Australian Federal Police (AFP), the NSW Police andVictoria Police has resulted in the arrest of a suspectbelieved to have been behind a series of high profileinternet attacks.
Following a series of DistributedDenial of Service (DDoS) attacks upon Internet Relay Chat(IRC) servers in Australia in 2005, Australian police usinginformation provided by the Belgian Federal Computer CrimeUnit began investigating the attacks which also affected theUnited States, Singapore and Austria.
The attacks werecarried out by means of IRC botnets. Botnets are networks ofcomputers on the Internet which have been compromised of botprograms, which are remotely controlled through InternetRelay Chat servers.
Bots spread by taking advantage ofcommon vulnerabilities on unprotected computers. Homepersonal computers are often a desirable target forattackers.
The bots, once installed on a host computerconnect to an IRC server and silently wait for furthercommands. By having all the bots connect to an IRC server,an attacker is able to control many (sometimes thousands ortens of thousands) bots at once by issuing commands that allthe bots will respond to. In this way botnets can be used tolaunch DDoS attacks by commanding all the bots to sendInternet traffic to a particular IP address at once.
The suspect, a 22-year-old male from Victoria will becharged with using a telecommunications network withintention to commit a serious offence under Section 474.14Criminal Code Act 1995.
DDoS attacks by bot networksare a major issue of concern and threat to Internet ServiceProviders.
Director of the AHTCC, Federal Agent KevinZuccato said Bot networks are also a concern to othersinvolved in the use and management of the Internet and itsfacilities. They are known to have been utilised by groupsto facilitate other unlawful activity.
"Bots and botnetworks continue to be of concern, and are linked, not onlyto DDoS attacks, but to a range of other malicious activityincluding identity theft and spam," Federal Agent Zuccatosaid.
"Home users can help protect their computersfrom becoming victims of bot activity by having up to dateanti-virus software and firewalls, as well as updating theiroperating systems as soon as security updates are madeavailable," he said.
People need to be aware of thepotential for illegal software to access and corrupt theircomputer systems and software. The maximum penalty for usinga telecommunications network with intention to commit aserious offence is 10 years imprisonment.
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