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CINA Research Findings: “Understanding Booter and Stresser Services To Engage in Cybercrime”
This webinar is open only to attendees from DHS, federal government, and state and local law enforcement.
Call-in details for the virtual meeting will be provided upon registration.
Join us on Wednesday, June 7th, from 1 to 2 p.m. for a webinar on “Understanding Booter and Stresser Services To Engage in Cybercrime.”
The findings presented during this webinar are informed by work led by Dr. Thomas J. Holt (Michigan State University) and Dr. Olga Smirnova (East Carolina University) through an active CINA project, “Understanding the Economy and Social Organization of the Underground Market for Cybercrime as a Service.”
There are a range of services available in the cybercrime-as-a-service ecosystem. While ransomware and stolen data generate headlines, there are other services that remain popular and useful for cybercriminals. In particular, “stresser” or “booter” services have been in operation since the early 2010s to offer distributed reflective denial of service (DRDoS) attacks. These services effectively knock resources offline, and have been the subject of multiple coordinated international law enforcement actions against both providers and clients. This presentation will provide an overview of the current state of booter and stresser operations using language from 44 booter and stresser operators. Attendees will learn the functionality of their operations, the ways that they communicate with customers, accept payments, and minimize their risk of detection. The implications for our understanding of illicit online markets, and the decision-making processes of cybercriminals will be explored as well.
Speaker Biography
Thomas J. Holt is a Professor in the School of Criminal Justice at Michigan State University specializing in cybercrime, technology, and deviance. His research focuses on computer hacking, malware, and the role that technology and the Internet play in facilitating all manner of crime and terror. Dr. Holt has been published in a variety of academic journals, including British Journal of Criminology, Crime and Delinquency, Deviant Behavior, and the Journal of Criminal Justice. He is also a coauthor of the books Cybercrime and Digital Forensics: An Introduction (2015) and Cybercrime in Progress: Theory and Prevention of Technology-Enabled Offenses (2016), both published through Routledge.