Bredolab Botnet Taken Down 187
Leon Buijs writes "Monday a 27-year-old Armenian was arrested at request of the Dutch authorities. The Dutch police think he is the brain behind the infamous, 30 million infected computers large Bredolab network, that was taken down by their Team (in Dutch) High Crime. Bredolab was used to spread virii and spam via the Netherlands. While taking the botnet down at a Dutch ISP, the suspect did several attempts to regain control. When this didn't work out, he did a DDoS attack on the ISP's servers using a 220,000 computers botnet. However, this was also broken off by taking 3 servers offline that the Armanian used for this, in Paris."
Well, I guess that leaves more hosts available (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Don't use made up words (Score:3, Insightful)
Treating of symptoms (Score:1, Insightful)
Dutch news is bringing this as if the police has taken down the whole botnet while in fact they've only taken down the servers that were controlling it. I'm not surprised if the botnet is already up and running again, controlled from a new location.
Re:Don't use made up words (Score:3, Insightful)
If a word is in common usage, even if it's just within a particular subculture, who is to say that it isn't a "real" word? You?
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Don't use made up words (Score:1, Insightful)
No, there isn't. There is no such word as "virii," even in English, no matter how much you might like to believe there is.
Don't believe me? Go check dictionary.com, your pocket Merriam-Webster dictionary, any reputable medical medical journal, or hell, the unabridged OED. It simply does not exist.
Using "virii" (or the equivalently stupid "boxen") in any context just makes you look like a pretentious dolt.
Re:Don't use made up words (Score:5, Insightful)
there is no such word as 'virii'.
Forsooth, dear sir! Thou hast yon goode pointe! Tounges be set upon stone, which hitherto is why Middle English is spake by e'ry gentleman today!
Which is to say, languages change. The summary used "virii,"we all knew what it meant, and it passes the "doesn't annoy me" test. So by my standards, it is a word despite what you and Webster's might say.
Capital Punishment!... Really!... Read On... (Score:4, Insightful)
Here's the deal. Back in the old west, horse staling was a capital crime. You didn't even need to be a real law enforcement officer to string someone up for stealing a horse!
Why was that? We don't knock off every car thief today, so why such harsh tratment for horse thieves? Two simple factors:
1. Horses were HUGELY important to the old west economy!
2. Stealing a horse is REALLY easy!
So... They made stealing a horse a capital crime as a strong deterrent to protect the business model from an otherwise trivial act.
See any Paralells???... The only way to deter hacking is to make the punishment much more severe than it is now. I'm not saying firing squad is the way to go for this guy, but something really bad.
Any Suggestions???
Re:Don't use made up words (Score:4, Insightful)
Why not? Doesn't everyone have equal say as to what constitutes common usage? If enough of us express our distaste for it then it may fall out of use and thus cease to be common usage. If not, then it may not. Everyone participates in forming the language. That includes dissing dorky neologisms.
Re:Don't use made up words (Score:3, Insightful)
> ...it passes the "doesn't annoy me" test.
Speak for yourself.
Re:Don't use made up words (Score:4, Insightful)
Try here:
http://www.onelook.com/?w=virii [onelook.com]
People keep using it and understanding it. In English. Which is made of words from several other languages, many misused to varying degrees relative to their foreign etymologies.
Dictionaries are descriptive, not prescriptive. They can tell you what a word you saw means, based on its previously observed contexts, but they can't tell you whether it's right or wrong. If they try, they are wrong.
The correct Latin plural would probably be virera. But we don't speak Latin any more. We only use it for religious sloganeering and high-falutin' biological codices.
That's if it's at all possible to pluralize it even in Latin. It's nearest synonym in English is "slime" or "pus", or the noun sense of "ooze", but we use it for "microphage", giving it countability. Like "water" or "blue" have no true plural in English, we nonetheless have invented "waters" and "blues" to describe situations where the singular form does not encompase the plurality of the context. Our choice of suffix in pluralization when inventing new words is entirely unbounded by any rules, as English has almost none given the many ancient systems it supports innately. So we resort to poetry, and choose one that sounds good.
I'll go with "virii" over "viruses" in almost every situation.
Oh, and I'm not a "pretentious dolt." I'm genuinely superior to you, intellectually.
Re:Treating of symptoms (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not surprised if the botnet is already up and running again, controlled from a new location.
I would be pretty surprised, seeing as how the controller is in custody.
Put This Guy Away So Long... (Score:4, Insightful)
This guy should be locked away until the day computers become so smart that none of them will cooperate with him anymore.