Mariposa bot author sentenced to prison

Matjaz Skorjanc, a.k.a. Iserdo, was sentenced to four years and ten months in prison last week by the District Court in Maribor, Slovenia.

He was found guilty of manufacturing “instruments intended for the breaking or illegal entry into the information system” and money laundering. He has also been ordered to pay a €3,000 fine and had his apartment and car confiscated, as they are believed to have been bought with the proceeds of crime.

His ex-girlfriend Nusa Coh was sentenced to eight months in probation for money laundering.

Skorjanc (27), a former Computer Science student was arrested in July 2010 by Slovenian Police following a joint action with FBI and Spanish Guardia Civil.

Known in the internet underground as Iserdo, he was the author of the Butterfly Bot which was sold to a Spanish criminal group that used it to build the Mariposa botnet. The estimates for a number of infected systems range from 8 to 12 million bots.

The prosecution estimates that the total damage caused by the malware is several tens of millions of Euros. Money from the bot sales was handled by Nusa Coh who claims that she was not aware of the illegality of her role.