Top cybercrime host and others get shut down

VolgaHost, the “World’s number one bad host”, has been taken offline on January 17th, reports malicious host-tracking outfit HostExploit.

A few weeks before that, other companies offering “bulletproof” hosting to cyber criminals were de-peered by RUNNet.ru, VolgaHost’s upstream provider: INFORMEX, Naukanet (TopNET) UA, PROMIRANET, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk Internet eXchange, Contel 2000 Ltd. and IT-OUTSOURCE-AS.

All of those providers were known to harbor C&C servers of various botnets, and VolgaHost was also hosting exploit servers, malicious URLs and other threats.

RUNNet.ru also de-peered Vline Telecom, but unfortunately this provider is also connected to the Internet through three other upstream providers: Global Network Managment Ltd., ComLine Ltd and JSC Telenet. It is believed that Vline Telecom currently serves six providers of questionable reputation.

“This is a major step in the ongoing fight against botnet hosting and CyberCrime as world’s worst host VolgaHost, and other associated crime servers, have disappeared,” says HostExploit’s Jart Armin.

But history has taught us that this is only a temporary victory and that criminals have a way of finding new unethical providers in a matter weeks, if not days. On the other hand, even small victories like these bring satisfaction.