Cyber attack targeting European spam-fighting group 'originated in Russia', says expert

A massive cyber attack targeting a European spam-fighting group that slowed some global Internet traffic have been launched by a gang of hackers from Russia and neighboring countries, an expert has said.

The head of a Russian firm specializing in defending against such attacks, Alexander Lyamin, said the same group that caused trouble around the world with its attack against the non-profit Spamhaus Project Ltd. had earlier launched a series of brief strikes on several top Russian Internet companies as a trial run of their weapon known as a Domain Name System amplification attack.

Lyamin, of Moscow's Highload Labs, said that they first noticed incidents utilizing this technique a month-and-a-half ago in Russia, the Wall Street Journal reports.

It started with a measly 10 to 20 gigabytes per second, but during the next month it grew to 60 and then 120 gigabytes, he said.

Apparently the attackers were growing their network of hacked servers, he added.

According to the paper, the attacks against Spamhaus began on March 19 and appeared to have subsided on Wednesday.

Some experts said the attack grew to as large as 300 gigabytes per second, which would make it the largest ever seen, although others, including Lyamin, dispute that

Lyamin didn't name the Russian companies that were the earlier targets because of "the very sensitive nature of this matter," but said they included services used by Russians every single day.