Industry News Home
More stories like this...
RSS FeedTeen admits million dollar botnet theft
An Australasian teenager has admitted running a botnet which stole in excess of NZD$20 million (£8 million).
Owen Thor Walker appeared in court earlier this week to plead guilty to cybercrime activity.
The New Zealander teen, whose online alias was Akill, was accused by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of being the leader of an international collection of malicious programmers.
FBI spokeswoman Cathy Milhoan told local news resource the Dominion Post that the US anti-cyber crime division worked alongside New Zealand authorities to reduce the prevalence of online threats.
"Cybercrime is third on the list of priority for the head of FBI, behind counter-terrorism and counter-intelligence," she added.
Recently, online information resource TechRepublic warned that botnets are becoming increasingly sophisticated as profit possibilities motivate criminals into engineering effective tools for their theft.
It noted that in order for hackers to maximise the revenue potential of each individual machine, they use malware with spyware capabilities built in to take over PCs.
PC Tools, Experts in Internet Security and trusted by millions worldwide! Visit www.pctools.com to upgrade your protection.
Related News
- July 21, 2009 - Older web users 'need internet security education'
- June 15, 2009 - Australian Tax Office spam scam uncovered
- June 11, 2009 - Australian ISPs come together to create E-security guidelines
- May 22, 2009 - Commonwealth Bank warns customers to watch out for phishing emails
- April 29, 2009 - Australian online traders' vulnerability exposed
PC Tools Spyware Doctor™ with AntiVirus
PC Tools™ Internet Security
