
Ask HN: Is it illegal to combat DDOS with a virus? - christophilus
We have the source for the botnet that seems to have caused yesterday&#x27;s internet outage: https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=12766950<p>Is it illegal to use this same code to go clean up infected devices, and also change their passwords to something more secure? I imagine the changing of the password would be illegal. Is there some action such a virus could take that would fix the problem legally?
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dragonbonheur
You're essentially appropriating other people's computing resources for your
own agenda, even if it's a good one, without the owner's permission. That's a
crime.

I'd just suggest using the scanning portion to identify unsecured connections
that should be added to a firewall's blacklist.

Maybe that could be a good SAAS service that would provide a blacklist of all
unsecured IOT devices and printers to everyone interested for blacklisting
purposes.

~~~
AznHisoka
Don't most of these devices send an unique user agent indicating what type of
device it's from?

If so why not block based on that?

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RandomlyGen
You'd still need to parse the UA, which takes resources. Plus the attackers
have root. What's preventing them from spoofing the UA?

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dozzie
Illegal _in which country_? Botnet's span is unlikely to be limited to USA
only.

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christophilus
Good point. USA, specifically, as that's where I live. I wonder if I'd be
prosecuted if I tried to help combat this by creating a white-hat version of
the software.

~~~
wayn3
Uusually, crime is prosecuted based on where it happened, not where the
perceived victim is located.

If you alter other peoples devices FROM the US, US law applies.

