'Reaper' IoT Botnet Likely a DDoS-for-Hire Tool

Latest IoT botnet commandeers 10,000 to 20,000 devices with an additional 2 million hosts identified.

The IoT botnet IoTroop has amassed 10,000 to 20,000 devices and has another 2 million hosts that have been identified as potential botnet nodes, according to Arbor's Security Engineering & Response Team (ASERT), which refers to the botnet as Reaper.

Although it's not clear why the 2 million hosts have not yet been absorbed into the Reaper botnet, Arbor Network's ASERT speculates that the botnet will likely be used as a booter/stresser service for China's internal DDoS-for-hire market.

Reaper contains a hint of code from the infamous IoT botnet Mirai and has the ability to launch SYN, ACK, and http floods, as well as DNS reflection/amplification attacks, according to the researchers.

Read more about Reaper here.

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