Security researcher finds the DDoS mastermind who took down the internet last fall

A distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack can take down a site, a server, or various parts of the internet. Attackers send to the target incredible amounts of junk traffic which bring their target down, making it impossible for real users to access that online service. One such attack happened back in mid-October last year, and it took out a large number of sites — the entire internet some would say — including Twitter, Spotify, Reddit, PayPal, and others.

Researchers found a Mirai botnet to be responsible for the entire thing, and now a renown security researcher thinks he has uncovered one of the creators of the Mirai botnet.

Brian Krebs, who often writes about online security and data breaches over at his own site Krebs On Security, was attacked with the help of Mirai in September 2016, with his site being down for almost four days. Since then, he has carefully investigated the matter, and he now thinks he knows who that person is. After months of digging, Krebs wrote an extensive story about the case, which reads like a mob story. Only everything he explains happens online.