Notes

Minecraft Link To Net's Biggest Botnet

Minecraft link to net's biggest botnet



20 January 2017



According to those who studied it the malware that launched the largest cyber-attack to hit the internet in its history included links to Minecraft servers.



Brian Krebs, security blogger was a long-term investigator of the attack that took his blog offline.



He claims that the genesis of the Mirai botnet can be traced back to rivalries in the Minecraft community.



He is supported by an expert in security, who has provided net security for Minecraft servers.



Robert Coelho, vice president of security firm ProxyPipe, told the BBC that his suspicions about who was behind the Mirai code have been referred to the FBI which is "actively looking into" the claims.



The botnet Mirai was made up of more than 500,000 web-connected devices like routers and webcams.



It launched attacks referred to as denial-of service (DDoS) which affected websites with such a large amount of data they fell apart, and were the biggest ever.



The victims that were taken offline included Twitter, Spotify and Reddit.



"Hundreds of hours"



Following the attacks, the person responsible - who went by the codename Anna Senpai published the source code online, opening the way for copycat attacks.



A modified form of the malware was later used to attack UK internet service providers TalkTalk and the Post Office.



Since being hit by the Mirai botnet in September 2016, Mr Krebs has put in "hundreds of hours" into uncovering who was behind it.



"If you've ever wondered why it seems that so few internet criminals are prosecuted I can assure you that the amount of perseverance and resources for investigation required to determine who's responsible for what (and the reasons behind it) in the online era is staggering," he wrote.



His research led him directly to the online community around Minecraft the computer game now owned by Microsoft that lets players create things using cubic blocks.



It is enjoyed by many, and especially children and is played by over one million people at any given time.



Mr Krebs claims that a Minecraft server with over 1,000 users can earn $50,000 per month (PS40,600). This is mainly due to users renting space to build their own Minecraft worlds.



He states that Anna Senpai's identity was not revealed until he figured out Mirai, the latest member of an IoT botnet family that had been developing for more than three years.



The code used in the earlier versions was commonly used to hack into web servers that host Minecraft He claims.



ProxyPipe is owned by Mr. Coelho - had plenty of Minecraft servers as clients. The server in mid-2015, it was attacked by a massive attack that was launched by a botnet made up of IoT devices, such as web cameras.



BBC interviewer Mr Coelho stated that he was concerned about the perpetrator and that "Minecraft is a tight-knit community." We know who is talking to whom."



He claimed that the attack was perpetrated by a rival security firm that also offered DDoS protection for Minecraft users.



He claimed that the person who founded the security company had previously run a Minecraft web server and was one of his clients.



He claims that Anna Senpai, the Mirai author, contacted him on Skype at September's end to explain that the attack against his company was "not personal" and to boast about how he was paid by the owners a large Minecraft server to launch an assault on another server.



What is an DDoS attack?



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MINECRAFT JAVA
Here's my website: https://minecraft-java.org/