Game publisher and developer giant Ubisoft filed a lawsuit in California on Thursday against a group of people who it claims run a distributed denial of service software network.
Attacks from DDoS networks, and services known as “booters,” can be used to knock game servers offline – including those that run online games such as Rainbow Six Siege.
Gamasutra recently reported that Ubisoft recently promised legal action against DDoS attackers who did hit R6S’s servers.
The lawsuit (available at Scribd) names a multitude of parties, many of whom are named “aka” alongside screen names, and some who are unknown except for screen names and email addresses.
It also names “SNG.ONE,” a website that sells subscriptions to potential users that provides access to the DDoS service. The lawsuit alleges that people can sign up on this website, buy a subscription, and then use the web-interface to launch DDoS attacks.
This is not an uncommon way for DDoS services to run. For example, the now-defunct Internet mayhem crew Lizard Squad – due to its members being arrested – used to sell access to “Lizard Stresser,” a DDoS-for-hire website. Like many such sites, it was eventually hacked, its user list exposed, and it was dismantled by law enforcement.
Not only did Lizard Squad members face legal trouble for running the DDoS-for-hire website, but subscribers using the site to deliver attacks also faced arrest and jail time in the United Kingdom.
Also similar to other Internet troll groups, defendants named in Ubisoft’s lawsuit sought to taunt Ubisoft via Twitter – which only added evidence for the lawsuit.
“Defendants are well aware of the harm that the DDoS Services and DDoS Attacks cause to Ubisoft,” the company wrote in the text of the lawsuit. “Indeed, Defendants have gone out of their way to taunt and attempt to embarrass Ubisoft for the damage its services have caused to R6S. For example, a Twitter account operated by one or more of Defendants has repeatedly mocked Ubisoft’s security efforts, including Ubisoft’s efforts to ban individuals utilizing Defendants’ DDoS Services.”
According to the lawsuit, named individuals also allegedly attempted to conceal evidence – rather too late – by faking up a fictional seizure notice on one of the DDoS-for-hire websites that claimed (falsely) that it had been seized by “Microsoft Inc. and Ubisoft Entertainment.”
The lawsuit also reads that the defendants created the fictional website “in order to get Ubisoft to admit that they have a problem.”
The tables have turned, of course, and now the DDoS attackers have a problem.
This is a civil lawsuit from Ubisoft. There are currently no details of law enforcement actions against these individuals, but looking at the history of the use of DDoS-for-hire sites and the outright illegality of DDoS services in both the U.S. and the U.K., among other countries, means that the defendants in this case, if caught, will probably be facing criminal charges as well.
Photo: Pixabay
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