DOJ Accuses Six With Crippling Rivals' Web Sites

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August 27, 2004 (1:00 PM EDT)

DOJ Accuses Six With Crippling Rivals' Web Sites

By Gregg Keizer ,

Among the more than 150 cybercrime arrests and convictions announced Thursday by the Department of Justice was an original: the nation's first case alleging denial of service attacks against competitors to knock them offline.
According to Attorney General John Ashcroft, six men were indicted this week by a federal grand jury in California on multiple charges for hiring hackers to launch denial-of-service (DoS) attacks against competitors.
The case illustrates "the increased use of the Internet to damage rival businesses and communicate threats for commercial advantage," said Ashcroft in a statement.
Jay Echouafni, 37, the chief executive officer of Orbit Communication, a satellite TV dealer in Sudbury, Mass., and his business partner, Paul Ashley, 30, were charged with hiring hackers in Arizona, Ohio, Louisiana, and the U.K. to launch "relentless computer attacks" against Orbit's online competitors, said Ashcroft. The remaining four indicted were the U.S. and U.K. hackers.
Beginning in October, 2003, Echouafni's attacks caused three competitors and an unidentified Internet service provider $2 million in lost revenue and direct costs dealing with the denial-of-service assaults.
The DoS attacks knocked Obit competitor Weaknees.com, a Los Angeles-based online retailer, offline for two weeks. After that, similar DoS attacks were launched against Rapid Satellite of Miami Beach, Fla., and Expert Satellite of Worcester, Mass.
According to affidavits filed by the FBI in the Central District of California federal court, one of the ISP's hosting a targeted site suffered more than $1 million in losses. That same ISP also hosted the web sites of the Department of Homeland Security and Amazon.com, both of which were temporarily disrupted by the attacks, said the FBI. Echouafni, a native of Morocco, is believed to have fled there after posting a $750,000 bail following his original arrest this spring.
The hired-gun hackers used bot networks, collections of previously-compromised computers, to actually conduct the DoS attacks. According to the FBI, one of the hackers controlled between 5,000 and 10,000 computers; another ruled a network of some 3,000 machines.
Orbit Communication was not available for comment, since its phones have been disconnected. Although its Web site remains live, the online chat support feature " which is supposed to be accessible 24/7 " is now "temporarily unavailable" said the company's Web site.
"The Internet is the bold new frontier of crime, but we're the new sheriff in town. For cyber criminals who operate out of Los Angeles or any location around the globe, this posse will bring you to justice," said United States Attorney Debra Wang.