Authorities in the U.K and Russia claim to have busted a major Internet extortion ring based in Russia.
Three men, ages 21, 22, and 24, were taken into custody this week in separate arrests in St. Petersburg, Russia, and the Saratov and Stavropol regions of southwest Russia. The men have not been charged, but are believed to be part of a ring that uses legions of compromised or "zombie" computers to launch denial of service attacks against online sports betting parlors ("sports books") that refuse to pay protection money, says Felicity Bull, a spokesperson for the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit (NHTCU).
In DoS attacks, Web servers are flooded with junk data and network traffic from thousands of machines, preventing them from responding to legitimate requests.
The NHCTU have been mentioned before. PCWorld is carrying this piece.
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