Three Botnet Operators Arrested

The FBI revealed that they've arrested three people who allegedly built and managed botnets.

In allegations released to the public this week, The FBI claims that James C. Brewer of Arlington, Texas unleashed botnet software that infected a hospital as well as tens of thousands of other computers worldwide.

Jason Michael Downey of Covington, Kentucky has been charged with using botnets to launch denial of service attacks. Robert Alan Soloway of Seattle, Washington, has been charnged with using botnets to send tens of millions of spam messges.

The arrests are part of the FBI's Operation Bot Roast. In addition to the arrests the operation has also identified at least a million computers infected with bot software.

"The majority of victims are not even aware that their computer has been compromised or their personal information exploited," said James Finch, assistant director of the FBI's Cyber Division.

The FBI is aware that other fraudsters might try to take advantage of the situation by attempting to manipulate people into divulging private information through fear tactics. "The FBI will not contact you online and request your personal information so be wary of fraud schemes that request this type of information, especially via unsolicited emails," a spokesperson for the bureau said.

The bureau is partnering with entitie in the industry, including the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) Coordination Center at Carnegie Mellon University, to try to notify people whose computers have been identified as infected with bots and to gather other information about related cybercrime.