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Brazilian botnet operator busted

by on22 August 2008

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Operated more than 100,000 infected computers

The U.S. Justice Department announced that it has charged a Brazilian with operating a botnet consisting of more than 100,000 computers that were infected with malicious software. The malicious software was said to be designed to send spam.

A botnet is a network of computers that are infected with software that can be controlled remotely. Botnets are normally used to send spam or to launch denial-of-service attacks to disable other computers. The owners of the infected computers used in a botnet, known as "zombies," usually do not know that their machines are infected or that they are being used in a botnet.

Leni de Abreu Neto, a 35-year-old from Taubate, Brazil, was indicted by a federal grand jury in New Orleans charging him with one count of conspiracy to cause damage to computers worldwide. If convicted, he could get up to five years in prison, plus up to three years of supervised release and a US$250,000 minimum fine that could increase based on the amount of monetary loss suffered by victims.

The indictment alleges that Neto conspired with Nordin Nasiri, a 19-year-old from the Netherlands to "use, maintain, lease and sell an illegal botnet." Neto is charged with working with Nasiri to broker the sale of the botnet to a third party for €25,000, or over US$37,000.

Dutch authorities caught Neto in the Netherlands and he is awaiting extradition to the U.S. Nasiri was arrested in the Netherlands and is being prosecuted there.

Last modified on 22 August 2008
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