Attacking with bitcoin: Using Bitcoin to Build Resilient Botnet Armies
This addresses a cybersecurity threat for botnet operators by enabling more resilient botnets, though it is incremental as it adapts existing blockchain technology to a new application.
The paper tackles the problem of botnet resilience against hostile takeovers by proposing a method to use the Bitcoin blockchain for dynamic command and control, resulting in a proof-of-concept resilient botnet implementation.
We focus on the problem of botnet orchestration and discuss how attackers can leverage decentralised technologies to dynamically control botnets with the goal of having botnets that are resilient against hostile takeovers. We cover critical elements of the Bitcoin blockchain and its usage for `floating command and control servers'. We further discuss how blockchain-based botnets can be built and include a detailed discussion of our implementation. We also showcase how specific Bitcoin APIs can be used in order to write extraneous data to the blockchain. Finally, while in this paper, we use Bitcoin to build our resilient botnet proof of concept, the threat is not limited to Bitcoin blockchain and can be generalized.