Your new partner "Tony Soprano"?

[netman4ttm]

This story from ComputerWorld will make you think

http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,95501,00.html?nas=WK-95501

[mushroom]

Partners bring something of benefit to the table, these people bring only trouble.

[Markll]

There may be a plus side to "Uncle Vito" having a vested interest in internet enterprise. A few "whacked" hackers or virus writers may discourage future attacks.

[wenwilder]

That would be great if they weren't hiring the hackers. And hackers know it. Which might explain the recent job plea in the newest mydoom code.

They recently shut down 10,000 drone computers but they were probably back up in less than an hour. The sophistcation of these operations only proves they are organized. It is very hard to fight that and hope to win. It's a jungle out there and unfortunately the animals are winning.

[mikmik]

Going price for network of zombie PCs: $2,000-$3,000 (http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/computersecurity/2004-09-08-zombieprice_x.htm)
By Byron Acohido and Jon Swartz, USA TODAY
In the calculus of Internet crime, two of the most sought-after commodities are zombie PCs and valid e-mail addresses
$5.00 Going price for 1 million email addresses
$50.00 Approximate price for use of 500 "zombie" PCs to blast out spam messages
$100,000 Alleged price an ex-AOL employee received for selling 92 million AOL screen names to spammers (or ~$1,000/million addresses)
Yikes!