Hackers rake it in with crash attacks

On-line “denial of service” attacks by computer hackers are on the increase, according to a new report.

Aug 25, 2005
By David Howell
James Thomson with City of London Police officers

On-line “denial of service” attacks by computer hackers are on the increase, according to a new report.

The latest UK Threat Assessment 2005 (www.ncis.co.uk/ukta.asp) published by the National Criminal Intelligence Service highlights the growing trend whereby criminal gangs use viruses and specially adapted computers to flood a targets computer systems with data that effectively means their customers can’t connect with their websites.

The websites that have come under attack are often hit with the equivalent of 200,000 emails per second, which cripples the website’s servers. The attacks are then followed with a demand for money that often is as little as $5,000. But with some of the websites being hit losing hundreds of thousands of dollars an hour, the target business often have no choice but to pay to minimise their websites downtime.

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