Internet attacks bigger, nastier

‘Attacks were merely a test’

NEW YORK, Oct 23, (AP): Could millions of connected cameras, thermostats and kids’ toys bring the internet to its knees? It’s beginning to look that way.

On Friday, epic cyberattacks crippled a major internet firm, repeatedly disrupting the availability of popular websites across the United States. The hacker group claiming responsibility says that the day’s antics were just a dry run and that it has its sights set on a much bigger target. And the attackers now have a secret weapon in the increasing array of internet-enabled household devices they can subvert and use to wreak havoc.

Manchester, New Hampshire-based Dyn Inc said its server infrastructure was hit by distributed denial-of-service, or DDoS, attacks. These work by overwhelming targeted machines with junk data traffic — sort of like knocking someone over by blasting them with a fire hose. The attack temporarily blocked some access to popular websites from across America and Europe such as Twitter, Netflix and PayPal.

Jason Read, founder of the internet performance monitoring firm CloudHarmony, owned by Gartner Inc, said his company tracked a half-hour-long disruption early Friday affecting access to many sites from the East Coast. A second attack later in the day spread disruption to the West Coast as well as some users in Europe.

Members of a shadowy hacker group that calls itself New World Hackers

The body of 15-year-old Nisa Mickens, who suffered head trauma and lacerations, was dumped on a road on Sept 13, police said. Her best friend, 16-year-old Kayla claimed responsibility for the attack via Twitter, though that claim could not be verified. They said they organized networks of connected devices to create a massive botnet that threw a monstrous 1.2 trillion bits of data every second at Dyn’s servers. Dyn officials wouldn’t confirm the figure during a conference call later Friday with reporters.

DDoS attacks have been growing in frequency and size in recent months. But if the hackers’ claims are true, Friday’s attacks take DDoS to a new level. According to a report from the cybersecurity firm Verisign, the largest DDoS attack perpetrated during the second quarter of this year peaked at just 256 billion bits per second.

Clocked

A huge September attack that shut down of security journalist Brian Krebs’ website clocked in at 620 billion bits per second. Research from the cybersecurity firm Flashpoint said Friday that the same kind of malware was used in the attacks against both Krebs and Dyn.

Lance Cottrell, chief scientist for the cybersecurity firm Ntrepid, said while DDoS attacks have been used for years, they’ve become very popular in recent months, thanks to the proliferation of “internet of things” devices ranging from connected thermostats to security cameras and smart TVs. Many of those devices feature little in the way of security, making them easy targets for hackers.

Cuevas, was found beaten to death a day later behind a home.

Two miles away in a wooded area, police made more grisly discoveries a week

The power of this kind of cyberattack is limited by the number of devices an attacker can connect to. Just a few years ago, most attackers were limited to infecting and recruiting “zombie” home PCs. But the popularity of new internet-connected gadgets has vastly increased the pool of potential devices they can weaponize. The average North American home contains 13 internet-connected devices, according to the research firm IHS Markit.

Since the attacks usually don’t harm the consumer electronics companies that build the devices, or the consumers that unwittingly use them, companies have little incentive to boost security, Cottrell said.

Like with other online attacks, the motivation behind DDoS attacks is usually mischief or money. Attackers have shut down websites in the past to make political statements. DDoS attacks have also been used in extortion attempts, something that’s been made easier by the advent of Bitcoin.

For its part, a member of New World Hackers told an AP reporter via Twitter direct message exchange that collective isn’t motivated by money and doesn’t have anything personal against Dyn, Twitter or any of the other sites affected by the attacks. Instead, the hacker said, the attacks were merely a test, and claimed that the next target will be the Russian government for committing alleged cyberattacks against the US earlier this year.

later: the remains of 19-year-old Oscar Acosta and 15-year-old Miguel GarciaMoran. Both had disappeared earlier this year.

“When the girls were murdered, the (Suffolk County) police commissioner made a commitment to the community to eradicate gang violence,” Meyers said. “We made strategic lists of gang members, with the goal to both quell the violence and to extract information about past crimes.” (AP)

‘Gov knew of plan’:

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was told about the lane closures that led to the “Bridgegate” scandal a month before they occurred, a former aide testified on Friday, contradicting Christie’s statements that he only learned about them afterward.

Bridget Kelly, the governor’s former deputy chief of staff, told jurors in federal court in Newark she discussed the plan to shut down access lanes to the George Washington Bridge with Christie in August 2013 and again in September as it was ongoing. She testified she had been frightened of Christie, saying he once threw a water bottle at her.

Kelly, who is on trial for her alleged role in the plot, said she believed at the time that the lane closures were for a legitimate traffic study, not a politically motivated scheme, and described it as such to Christie. (RTRS)