hackers annoying PaddyPower!

eirebhoy

I heard on the radio yesterday that there are people hacking into hundres of computers and sending them all to the PaddyPower website. This causes the website to close down and people can't bet on big events. They then send an e-mail to PP and ask for a few thousand pounds and they will stop annoying him.

PP reported it to the police and they are getting it investigated. I have just tried to get onto the website and it is down again.

W@NKERS!!!

eirebhoy

Here is an article on it:
http://sport.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,10488,1154429,00.html

Web bookies held to ransom

Events such as Grand National, FA Cup final and European Championship targetted.

Vivek Chaudhary and Greg Wood
Tuesday February 24, 2004
The Guardian

Police are to investigate six cases of British internet bookmakers allegedly being blackmailed by hackers threatening to disrupt online betting ahead of

major sports events such as the Grand National, FA Cup final and this summer's European Championship.
The hackers, believed to be based in eastern Europe, have threatened to paralyse bookmakers' websites. Email demands have been sent for between £20,000 and £30,000 to end the attacks.

A spokesman for Paddy Power, one of the internet firms targeted, said: "They're not really hackers, it's more like spammers - they keep logging on so that the site slows right down and no one else can get in. It's like putting 100 people in front of a betting shop to jam up the door.

"My understanding is that they commandeer a load of machines that aren't being used at night and use them to bombard the site. It's like the busiest day you've ever had, multiplied by 20.

"Then they send you an email saying that they slowed the site down the night before and if we pay them loads of money they'll leave us alone. It's just cheap extortion."

The hackers use what is known as a distributed denial-of-service attack, where targets are deluged with requests for information which can paralyse websites for 24 hours.

The attacks could cost bookmakers hundreds of thousands of pounds in turnover as many punters would be unable to place bets via the internet sites simply because they cannot gain access to them. A number of American offshore websites were targeted before last month's Super Bowl, with emails demanding money.

The racket is being investigated by the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit, the national police agency that is responsible for computer crime.

A spokesman said: "We can confirm we are investigating six cases of British bookmakers being blackmailed. [They] came to us with this problem some time ago and investigations are continuing in Britain and abroad. Many American betting websites have also been targeted with blackmailers extorting money [via] emails."

Paddy Power admitted that its site was offline for several hours this month following an attack. The bookmaker said that it had been targeted on the night of the Super Bowl, paralysing its website for several hours. Police were informed and the company also sent out 30,000 emails to its customers explaining the reason for the disruption.

"We're not the only bookmakers who've had this happen," the firm's spokesman added. "Our response has been very proactive, we reported it to the police as soon as it happened. We weren't expecting to experience anything like it, and now our technical people are trying the most up-to-date ways to filter this out and make sure that it doesn't get to the site."

vgar

Does this mean we cant place bets on how long it will take for them to cath the little hacker w@nkers? :-)

BlitzKrieg

could be usefull when you know your gonna loose a bet...no wait it cant.


but clever all the same (but wrong) man i hate trying to be PC...


-I wish for a hacker who will take all the f*ckers who send the ordinary person spam and f*ck them over for a change...

Karl Hungus

Did anyone else read the topic as "Hackers annoying Paddy20"?:D

Johnny Versace

As far as I am aware a correctly configured server can withstand denial of service attacks? I don't remember microsoft.com going down due to anything like this...

Grom

For started its simply called a ddos attack and their are ways to make yourself more secure towards it.Maybe if paddy actually indare some security onto there site they wont need to waste the media's time with worthless trype like this

Tyrrial

thats just not a nice thing to do

MrNuked

I got a mail today saying that an error had caused incorrect processing of the bets on some horse race today, but that my winnings had now been added to my account. Nice of them since I haven't used my account for years and never bet on that race. Must try to recall my password and see if they actually did give me some cash. No of course they didn't; they just tricked me into visiting their site.

anthonymcg

Why do they call these jokers "Hackers"? They set up a DDOS attack, wow, thats complicated.

AL][EN

Originally posted by anthonymcg
Why do they call these jokers "Hackers"? They set up a DDOS attack, wow, thats complicated.

script kiddies :rolleyes:

BKtje

explain to me how its a ddos attack if all they are doing is forwarding people to the site. How can you figure out who to send the page to and who not if they are all asking for the same thing. A ddos usually sends useless packets so tis not all the hard to filter out but when a load of people ask for the webpage theres not much you can do surely?

Please feel free to point out the errors

po0k

Originally posted by AngelWhore
Did anyone else read the topic as "Hackers annoying Paddy20"?:D

I did

dahamsta

Originally posted by Johnny Versace
As far as I am aware a correctly configured server can withstand denial of service attacks? I don't remember microsoft.com going down due to anything like this...

The last time it happened, Microsoft blackholed the hostname slated for attack beforehand, and moved the site (Windows Update) to another hostname.

Originally posted by B-K-DzR
explain to me how its a ddos attack if all they are doing is forwarding people to the site.

Doesn't matter how it happens as long as it denies service. Hence the name.

adam