Tech Tent: Minecraft and A Botnet Battle
Tech Tent: Minecraft and a botnet war Rory C.Jones Technology correspondent @BBCRoryCJon on Twitter
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My podcast's top story this week is Cyberwarfare that is raging under the surface of a game with a primary audience of children.
We also examine the fight against fake news in Europe and learn about how South Korean electronics giant Samsung was implicated in a corruption scandal.
Minecraft and a botnet fight
The Mirai botnet hijacked thousands of connected devices to launch huge denial of service attacks (DDoS) against major websites last year . It also it sparked an alarming concern about the security of the Internet of Things.
One of the victims of the attacks, security researcher Brian Krebs, has published an extensive investigation into the background of Mirai and the people who were behind it. This took him many months to complete and is an excellent piece of investigative journalism.
The most extraordinary aspect of his story is that it was a fight over the game of education that is so popular Minecraft which led to the massively disruptive DDoS attacks.
It turns out that these attacks are used against very lucrative Minecraft servers, as well as the companies that offer them security protection. Robert Coelho, whose ProxyPipe helps clients to deal with DDoS attacks, was among the victims.
He tells us: "We can't have servers down for more than 10 seconds at a single time." If that happens, players will move elsewhere, while server firms will look for other security companies.
Coelho claims that there are a lot of bad actors in Minecraft. "Because many servers are run underage and there's a lot of money involved, hacking is frequent."
Another thing that stands out about Brian Krebs' article is the youth of many of those involved in these online fights.
It seems some of the most destructive and devastating attacks the world has seen have been carried out by those who are still in their teens. They might think that this is an innocent game however, with the FBI investigating the case, they might find serious consequences.
Fake news is being attacked at Europe
We've previously discussed fake information on social media with regards to the US election. However now, with France and Germany having voted this year it has pushed to the top of the European agenda.
This week Facebook unveiled plans to help battle fake stories in Germany. Articles flagged by readers as suspicious will be scrutinized by an independent investigative journalism and fact-checking group called Correctiv.
"We find that populists all over Germany are using fake news to change the mood of the people," David Schraven from Correctiv informs me. He acknowledges that his organization has a lot to do but insists that it's essential for the democratic process: "It's very important to make a good decision in an election, to be aware as much as you can about the truth in the society."
The vice president of the European Commission, Andrus Ansip, who is responsible for the Digital Single Market, admits there's an issue. He said it's up to social media platforms to deal with the issue, not governments. "Fake news is bad but Ministry of Truth is worse", he told our reporter Joe Miller in Davos at the World Economic Forum.
He believes that If people don't believe the information they receive from platforms like Facebook or Twitter and Twitter, they will look to another platform. The issue will become self-correcting. This could be a positive reflection of the importance social media users place on reliable news.
Samsung's problems
Samsung, the mobile phone manufacturer, has had a rough few months. When some of its Galaxy Note 7 phones caught fire, it had to take out the phone. (We will hear more about it when it unveils the results of its investigation into the issue on Monday).
Now , it's been implicated in the corruption scandal that afflicted the South Korean President Park Geun Hye.
JY Lee JY Lee, the Samsung director, was interviewed by investigators over allegations of bribery to get support for a merger.
Despite these challenges, Samsung seems able to continue its business as usual, with the Korean public not being worried about its business practices. Steve Evans, our man in Seoul is on the show to explain how important Samsung is to the South Korean economy. The company's revenue makes up 17% of South Korea's GDP. This industrial conglomerate also manufactures mobile phones and is involved in all sorts of things from funerals to hospitals. Koreans have to deal with Samsung from the time they are born to the grave.