Posted: 25th May, 2005 By: MarkJ
35 government agencies worldwide have joined with the USA's Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in taking a tougher stance against ISP customers with PC's known to have been compromised by SPAM outputting Trojans (zombies):
The group is encouraging ISPs to identify and quarantine customers whose PCs may have unwittingly been turned into spam zombies, under the control of hackers.
ISPs are also being encouraged to apply rate-limiting controls for email relays and to block port 25 (a common Internet port used for email) for inappropriate use as part of an educational campaign called Operation Spam Zombies. ISPs are also being urged to educate consumers about net security and to provide tools to disinfect computers under one of the most ambitious net security education initiatives to date.
Trojans such as Phatbot are often used to seize control of Windows PCs, turning them into zombie clients in networks of compromised PCs (botnets). These botnets are used to send spam or as platforms for DDoS attacks, carrying out criminal attacks right under the noses of their rightful owners.The UK is known to have given its backing to the initiative, which will mean that ISP's here will need to pay much closer attention to the security of their users. More @
The Register.