Botnet speed test uncovers drag racers of malware Researchers have discovered that Zombie machines within the Xarvester and Rustock botnets are capable of sending up to 25,000 junk mail messages per hour. The speed test, by security researchers at Marshal8e6, found that the two botnets are the muscle cars of the world of malware. Marshal8e6 deliberately infested its lab …
"Over the past few years, botnets have revolutionised the spam industry and pushed spam volumes to epidemic proportions despite the best efforts of law enforcement and the computer security industry,"
Well, clearly, the only solution is to take control of the botnets and disinfect them. I know it's illegal, but the problem can't be solved if the computer security industry has both hands tied behind its back. We should hold our noses and allow them to get on with it.
Probably because they don't want to deal with the customer asking things like "Why is my internet down?" and deal with other verbal diarrhoea coming with it, and just get on with raking in the cash from the gullible.
I'm happy to be a customer of one that does actively combat misuse in the way you suggest:
A customer found to be spouting rubbish over their connection is shoved onto a heavily filtered and throttled proxy, only allowing enough access to get OS/Antivirus updates and access to the ISP helpdesk.
An official warning is sent to their primary account address, to warn them of what is going on and what has been done, and the steps required to get normal service again.
Failing to clean up results in a speedy termination of the contract.
Problem solved.
Another good thing they do is they have recently started providing courses on computer/online safety and best practises for their customers.
You call your ISP and they tell you you're infected and will disallow you connection until you're clear.
It's called 'quarantine'.
You wouldn't allow someone with a highly contagious disease wander into a shopping centre looking for cure, would you?
Infected people will then take a great deal more care. As I understand it, most of the infected PC's in the world are owned by people who don't care. If they're cut off, they will. Simple.
How about all those mail servers that accept mail on port 25 which is destined for outside networks? Those bastards allow spam access to mail servers blocking based on the SpamHaus PBL, which does a lot to block bot-net sourced spam, since most bots are on DHCP home network connections, which are reasonable easy to find, and which should never be sending mail on port 25, unless it's through a proxy run by their ISP... and honestly that should only accept mail on the submission port anyhow. No mail server should have it's legit users sending mail through port 25 at all, and they should require authentication on 587.
But yeah, ISPs don't do it right either.
that when the LEAs do bust the bastards responsible for these botnets all that happens is that they get offered cushy jobs with security companies. So there's a strong incentive for malware authors to keep on pushing their crap, because they know full well that if they do get caught, they will be rewarded with lucrative jobs instead of being punished as they should be. Now if instead we had actual laws in place prohibiting convicted criminals from being employed as a result of their crimes and instead locked the little bastards up and threw away the key, that at least would be a start in curbing this plague. But as long as things go on as they are, we can only look forward to the Internet eventually being rendered completely unusable as every dick and their dog climbs onto the botnet bandwagon knowing they'll come out of it covered with gold.
but is your email server sending hundreds of thousands of emails a day over a typical home consumer broadband connection? If not, then you wouldn't get blocked. If you really need to, then wouldn't the small inconvenience of getting the ISP to exclude you from being put on the block list be worth it to allow them to put a system in place which reduces the huge amount of spam getting sent from the PCs of less tech-savvy users?
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