Evgeniy Bogachev

Gameover ZeuS is a peer-to-peer botnet based on components from the earlier ZeuS trojan. The malware was created by Evgeniy Mikhailovich Bogachev of Russia. It is believed to have been spread through use of the Cutwail botnet.

Unlike its predecessor the ZeuS trojan, Gameover ZeuS uses an encrypted peer-to-peer communication system to communicate between its nodes and its command and control servers, greatly reducing its vulnerability to law enforcement operations. The algorithm used appears to be modeled on the Kademlia P2P protocol.

Scammers control and monitor Gameover ZeuS via Command and Control (C&C) server. The virus establishes the connection to the server as soon as its malicious executable installs on the computer, disables certain system processes, download and launch executables, or even delete essential system files, easily bricking the device.

According to a report by Symantec, Gameover ZeuS has largely been used for banking fraud and distribution of the CryptoLocker ransomware.

In early June 2014, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that an international inter-agency collaboration named Operation Tovar had succeeded in temporarily cutting communication between Gameover ZeuS and its command and control servers. This was an effort to shut down Evgeniy Mikhailovich Bogachev criminal infrastructure and liberate computers infected with GameOver ZeuS.

"He has been indicted in the United States, accused of creating a sprawling network of virus-infected computers to siphon hundreds of millions of dollars from bank accounts around the world, targeting anyone with enough money worth stealing." In a widely circulated photo he has been pictured holding a domestic Bengal cat.

Bitdefenderhas identified two Gameover ZeuS variants in the wild: one of them generates 1,000 domains per day and the other generates 10,000 per day.

FBI Reward

On 24 February 2015, the FBI announced a reward of up to $3 million in exchange for information regarding alleged Russian cyber criminal Evgeniy Mikhailovich Bogachev ( known online aliases : «Slavik», «lucky12345», «Pollingsoon», «Monstr», «IOO» and «Nu11» ) over his suspected association with Gameover ZeuS.

The FBI reward of $3 million is the highest ever for a cybercriminal.