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Criminals earn less than minimum wage when

blasting websites off the internet
By: Graham Cluley |

comment : 0 |

March 04, 2016 | Posted in: Industry News

Want to knock a website off the internet for 48 hours? That will cost you a mere $173.
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Adware

Android

Antivirus

Apple

Anonymous
Attack

Backdoor

Criminals earn less than minimum wage when blasting websites off the internet HOTforSecurity

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Bitdefender
Cyber-attack

source: Arbor Networks

Breach

China

Data Breach

DDoS

Exploit
Facebook
Facebook Scams
E-THREATS
You may take password security
Bitdefender Products
the surprising findings uncovered by a behind-the-scenes look into theALERTS
DDoS-for-hire industry,
seriously now, but your past can haunt
Ready to Embrace
Fbi
Fraud
Google
Hack
rbor Networks researcher Dennis
Schwarz.
SOCIAL NETWORKS
you
Windows 10
INDUSTRY NEWS
July 08, 2015
Hacker
Hackers
Hacking
Three Samsung KNOX Vulnerabilities
d his attention on a Russian-language hacker called Forceful, who rents MALWARECITY
out his booter services
Dropped by Israeli Researchers
Windows
8 StoresinLogon
BITDEFENDER TECHNOLOGY Malware
Microsoft
Omelette
is interested
launching a distributed denial-of-servic

Passwords in Plain Text

VIDEOS
Power Plant Controllers Deemed
October 12, 2012
Vulnerable
Beyondservice
Repairwas aided by publicBOTNETS
on into Forcefuls so-called booter
or stresser
mistakes made by the
CONTEST
allowed Arbor Networks to keep a beady eye on Forcefuls botnet and command & control center.
1800+ Minecraft
IoT proliferation, the biggest blind spot
HACKING
usernames and passwords
for companies
HOW TO.
leak online
Forceful will charge you $60 per day to rent out his booter, or $400 if you need a site to be taken out
MALWARE HISTORY
January 19, 2015
US CISOs earnings reach $400K+ in
MISCELLANEOUS
San Francisco, survey finds
PHISHING ALERT
Scammers Impersonate
Forcefuls daily rate works out to approximately $2.50 per hour less than the minimum working wage in many
Q&A FROM THE LABS
Bank Exec on LinkedIn to
countries.
Target Corporate Bank
SOCIAL NETWORKS
Accounts

SPAM

May
08, 2013
If youre
not sure if Forceful is the right DDoS attacker for you, well hes thought of that. He
advertises
a free test,
SPAM
REVIEW
lasting five to ten minutes on a Russian crime forum.
UNCATEGORIZED
VIRUSES DESCRIPTIONS
VULNERABILITIES
Since last July, Forcefuls DDoS bot has been used against 108 targets, with attacks lasting
between one hour to
two weeks.

WEEKLY REVIEW
MOBILE & GADGETS

TIPS AND
TRICKS
The rewards for this criminal activity are not considerable, and it doesnt sound as if Forceful
is going
to get rich
quick:

2012 Powered By Bitdefender

Password
Ransomware
Security

Windows

Privacy

Scam

Scams

Slider

Software
Uk

Phishing

Spam
Us

Virus
Worm

Social Media
Trojan

Twitter

Vulnerability

Criminals earn less than minimum wage when blasting websites off the internet HOTforSecurity

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Of course, this may not be the only income source for those renting out DDoS attacks. DDoS mitigation firm
CloudFlare reported this week that it has seen a dramatic rise in the number of individual DDoS attacks, with many
focused on the weekend.

The largest attack CloudFlare saw during the month of February peaked at 400 Gbps.

Thats about a 15x increase in individual DoS events. These new attacks are
interesting for a couple of reasons. First, the spikes align with the weekends. It seems
the attackers are busy with something else during the week. Second, they are targeting
a couple of fairly benign websitesthis demonstrates that anybody can become the
target of a large attack. Third, the overall volume of the attack is enormous.

What is surprising is just how much of a difference there is between the cost of renting a DDoS attack and the
estimated potential financial damage that such an attack can inflict on an online company. In a recent report, Arbor
calculated that a DDoS attack costs victims on average approximately $500 per *minute*.

Criminals earn less than minimum wage when blasting websites off the internet HOTforSecurity

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Of course, the costs of running a booter/stresser service are very low theyre not paying taxes, and are exploiting
compromised computers, servers and poorly-configured home broadband routers to launch their attacks, rather than
having to purchase and maintain the infrastructure themselves.

And if someone really wants to make money from a DDoS attack, the big money is not so much in renting out the
booter service to bring down the websites but in attempting to extort money from victims, with the blackmail threat
that their sites will stay down unless they pay up.

Any company which relies upon its website to make money, and provide services to its customers, needs to
consider very seriously what it is going to do about DDoS attacks. The problem isnt going away, and its just getting
worse. And as long as computer users continue to attach devices to the internet which are poorly defended against
being hijacked by online criminals, I cannot see that threat disappearing.

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About The Author

Graham Cluley
Security analyst
Graham Cluley is an award-winning security blogger, researcher and public speaker. He has
been working in the computer security industry since the early 1990s, having been employed
by companies such as Sophos, McAfee and Dr Solomon's. He has given talks about
computer security for some of the world's largest companies, worked with law enforcement
agencies on investigations into hacking groups, and regularly appears on TV and radio
explaining computer security threats. Graham Cluley was inducted into the InfoSecurity
Europe Hall of Fame in 2011, and was given an honorary mention in the "10 Greatest Britons
in IT History" for his contribution as a leading authority in internet security.
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