Two Scots held as global cyber attacks probed
TWO Scots have been arrested after an international investigation into a website blamed for more than four million cyber attacks on police, governments and banks.
The men were held in Lanarkshire during a series of swoops around the world in connection with Webstresser.org.
The website was used to launch ‘distributed denial of service’ (DDOS) attacks – designed to cripple computer systems by overwhelming them with traffic.
Some 136,000 users – many of them teenagers – were registered
‘Sophisticated crime group’
on the Webstresser.org site, where an attack could be commissioned for as little as £11.
The site was one of many operating openly as a ‘stresser’ business, supposedly offering to test companies’ cyber defences.
In reality, customers paid for online attacks on targets of their choice – ranging from banks to colleges and online games – in an effort to disrupt their business.
Police said some cyber criminals tried to blackmail companies, threatening to disable their systems unless they paid significant ransom demands. The two Scots were arrested on Tuesday in connection with offences under the Computer Misuse Act.
Authorities in the Netherlands, Serbia, Croatia, hong Kong and Canada also arrested suspects.
The operation was supported by Europol – the EU agency for police cooperation – which claims the website was the largest vendor of DDOS attacks.
Dutch, US and German police also seized servers and other equipment, taking down the website at 11.30am yesterday.
An address in Bradford, West Yorkshire, linked to attacks on seven of the UK’s biggest banks last year, was also raided.
Croatian police said a 19-yearold, whom they described as the owner of Webstresser.org, was detained on charges of ‘serious criminal acts against computer systems, programs and data’.
The UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA), which led the international inquiry, said its officers identified a ‘criminal infrastructure’ in the Netherlands as part of a continuing campaign against ‘DDOS-for-hire’ services.
NCA senior investigating officer Jo Goodall said: ‘A significant criminal website has been shut down and the sophisticated crime group behind it stopped as a result of an international investigation involving law enforcement agencies from 11 countries.’
She added: ‘We expect to identify further suspects linked to the site in the coming weeks and months as we examine the evidence we have gathered.’
A Police Scotland spokesman said: ‘As part of an international operation involving law enforcement agencies across Europe, officers from the Police Scotland Cybercrime Unit have arrested two males from the Lanarkshire area in connection with Computer Misuse Act offences.
‘Investigations are ongoing and it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time.’
Gert ras, of the Dutch police, said: ‘We have made an unprecedented impact on DDOS cybercrime.’ he added: ‘Users will now face prosecution and civil liability for caused damage.’