Through cooperatimg cybercriminals are able to infect computers with truckloads of malware.
Such a malicious wolfpack is called a BotnetWeb, re:
http://blog.fireeye.com/research/2009/04/botnetweb.html"a collection of heterogeneous Botnets, that is used in a combination for the single purpose of infecting with malware, and is being herded by one or more closely related criminal groups",
this according to the way Atif Atif Mushtaq, researcher for FireEye Malware Intelligence Lab defines it.
This researcher found that various malware infections may be closely related,
that these actions are run by the same group or another group pays them to infect.
The 'Virut' BotnetWeb can be an example of what a tremendous threat comes from these kinds of wolf packs. Re:
http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=128757Those infected by virut will have dozens of other malware installed within minutes of infection,
like bots, Trojans, key loggers and a load of fake-virus scanners.
Removing one infection does not help much against those that stay behind.
A collective.
Cooperation does not only give an increase of infection capability onto a system,
because of the various layers it is enrolled, it is very difficult to take out those malcreants,
that partake in these actions,
"Unless we block the top level nodes (the generic downloaders)
they just will keep on launching new and updated malware", according to Mushtaq.
He is almost certain a similar situation arose when spamhoster McColo was taken down.
Over 45% of all malware that is currently around, is part of a malicious BotnetWeb.
"We all know how big this malware problem has become.
If you look at malware separately, it is a threat that can be damaging to computers in various ways.
But as a collective they form very threatening wolf packs.
We should never forget that these Bot armies were used to launch cyberattacks on countries as well."
pol