Notes

Tech Tent: Minecraft and A Botnet Battle

Tech Tent: Minecraft and a botnet war Rory C.Jones Technology reporter @BBCRoryCJon Twitter



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My podcast's most talked-about story this week is Cyberwarfare which is raging beneath the surface of a game that has a primary audience of children.



We also examine Europe's fight against fake news and learn how South Korean electronics giant Samsung was implicated in corruption scandal.



Minecraft and a botnet fight



The Mirai botnet took over thousands of connected devices to launch massive attacks of denial of service (DDoS) against major websites in the last year. in the process sparked an alarming concern about the security of the Internet of Things.



Brian Krebs, a security researcher, was one of the victims. He has published a thorough investigation into Mirai's origins and the people behind it. It took him several months to complete and is a fantastic piece of investigative journalism.



The most fascinating aspect of his story is that it was a fight over the game of education that is so popular Minecraft that resulted in the hugely disruptive DDoS attacks.



These attacks are used against extremely lucrative Minecraft servers and companies that provide security protection. One of those who were targeted was Robert Coelho, whose firm ProxyPipe helps clients deal with DDoS attacks.



He added, "We can't have servers down for more than 10 minutes at once." If this happens, players leave and servers look for alternative security providers.



"There's many bad players in Minecraft," Coelho explains, "because a lot of servers are operated by minors and there's lots of money involved, which means that attacks are quite frequent."



Brian Krebs' article also emphasizes the youth of many people involved in these online fights.



Teenagers seem to have carried out some of the most devastating and damaging attacks that the world has ever seen. I suspect that they may see this all as just a game - but with the FBI investigating, they could face serious consequences.



Fake news is being attacked at Europe



We've covered the issue of fake news on social media as it was related to US elections However, with Germany and France having voted this year, it has become a topic of discussion in Europe.



This week Facebook unveiled plans to help battle fake stories in Germany. Articles that have been flagged by readers as dubious will be scrutinized by an independent investigative journalism and fact-checking organization called Correctiv.



"We see that populists all over Germany are using fake news to change the mood of the people," David Schraven from Correctiv informs me. He acknowledges that the organization faces a huge task but he believes it is essential for democracy: "It's very important to make the right decision in an election, and to know as much as you can about the truth of society."



Andrus Ansip (Vice President of the European Commission), is responsible for the Digital Single Market. He acknowledges that there is an issue. He said that it is up to social media platforms to tackle the issue, not governments. "Fake news is bad but Ministry of Truth is worse", he told our reporter Joe Miller in Davos at the World Economic Forum.



He believes that if people no longer trust what they read on platforms such as Facebook or Twitter they will move to other platforms and the issue will self-correct. This could be a positive reflection of the importance that social media users place on accurate news.



Samsung's woes



Samsung, the company that makes mobile phones has had a tough few months. First it had to withdraw its Galaxy Note 7 phone after some of them caught on fire. (We'll learn more about this Monday when it will release the results of its investigation into the issue.



Now , it's been implicated in the corruption scandal that afflicted the South Korean President Park Geun Hye.



Five Samsung executives, including the boss JY Lee were questioned by the company's board of directors about allegations that bribes were allegedly paid to gain support for the merger.
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Despite these crises, the company seems to sail on and the Korean public not greatly disturbed about its conduct. Our host in Seoul, Steve Evans, is on the programme to tell us just how central Samsung is to the economy of South Korea. Its revenues make up 17% of South Korea's GDP. Samsung is a major industrial conglomerate that produces mobile phones and is involved in every aspect of life, from hospitals to funerals. Koreans have come to know Samsung from the cradle until the grave.


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