Californian bot herder pleads guilty
Published: 24 Jan 2006 16:55 GMT
A US man has pleaded guilty to leasing out networks of compromised computers to criminals so they can carry out denial of service and spam attacks.
Twenty-year old Californian Jeanson James Ancheta faces up to six years in prison for felony charges that include making more than $61,000 (£34,000) from renting the illegal networks and infecting US military computers.
The Associated Press reports that Ancheta, who will be sentenced before a US District Court on 1 May, stands to lose his BMW and more than $58,000.
Reports suggest this could be the first case to take aim at people who profit from 'botnets' — networks of virus-infected computers used by hackers to launch attacks.
Last year Ancheta was charged with 17 counts of conspiracy fraud after a 14-month hacking spree.
James Rendell, senior technology specialist at ISS, said: "Those who actively target businesses and computer users with malicious activities will not get away with it.
"Not only is it reassuring to see the US government prosecuting this 20-year-old where he actively targeted thousands of computer systems and infected them with malicious software for his own financial gain but it also shows the seriousness of this crime spree."
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