FBI's Operation Bot Roast announces three arrests

The FBI today released a press release summarizing the bureau's efforts so far to shut down botnets. In the release, the FBI acknowledges the work of the CERT Coordination Center at Carnegie Mellon University, Microsoft, and the Botnet Task Force, for either contacting victims or reporting criminal activity. Through an ongoing investigation known as Operation Bot Roast, the bureau has uncovered many botnets, collections of compromised desktop PCs worldwide, that have been used for various criminal activities.

In the release, the bureau cites the recent arrests of James C. Brewer of Arlington, Texas, who is alleged to have operated a botnet created from compromised computers at Chicago area hospitals; Jason Michael Downey of Covington, Kentucky, who is alleged to have used botnets to engage in targeted denial-of-service attacks; and Robert Alan Soloway of Seattle, Washington, who is alleged to have used botnets to relay tens of millions of spam e-mails.