Fergie's Tech Blog

Botnet Farmers Play the International Exchange Game

John Leyden writes on Channel Register:

Spyware authors are prepared to pay botnet farmers or webmasters much more for infecting PCs in the UK or Australia than machines in continental Europe.

Selling "installs" is a common practice in the cyber-underworld, the most notable example being in 2005 when Jeanson Ancheta was arrested for building a 400,000-strong botnet and installing adware from 180 solutions for a fee of $60,000. Cybercriminals have since moved on to installing spyware onto compromised machines.

The income that can be earned grows with the numbers of installs, and varies based on the geographical location of an installation. For example, installing spyware on 1,000 machines in Australia earns $100 but only $50 in the US, and a measly $3 in Asia. A sample price list obtained by net security services firm sheds fresh light on the phenomenon.

posted by Fergie @ 3/19/2008 11:08:00 AM