Great followup story on the online extortion industry. Several offshore gambling sites were hit by DDoS attacks and had severe problems. This story outlines how they dealt with the attackers.

Rather than brass knuckles and baseball bats, the weapons of choice for these digital extortionists are thousands of computers. They use them to launch coordinated attacks that knock targeted websites off-line for days, or even weeks, at a time.

The shakedowns generate millions of dollars. Many Internet operators would rather pay protection money than risk even greater losses if their websites go down.

After more than a year perfecting their techniques on gambling and pornographic websites, the gangs are starting to turn their talents to mainstream e-commerce operations.

posted by mt at 14:25