E-commerce company offers $23,000 to catch DDoS attacker who demands Bitcoin

     An e-commerce retailer is offering a $23,181 (£15,000) bounty for the capture of attackers who launched a DDoS attack on the company's website and then demanded a bitcoin ransom.

     Aria Taheri, owner and general manager of hardware provider Aria Technology, told CRN his company's website was hacked Monday afternoon and the hackers demanded a payment of 16.66 bitcoins (about $4,433.89).

     The company also took to Twitter to announce the bonuses it was offering:

     "Remember our website was down yesterday, it was the attackers that were causing this! Help us catch them and we will give you a reward of £15,000! - Aria PC Technology, October 20, 2015"

     In an interview with CRN, Taheri added that he would not pay the Bitcoin ransom because doing so would encourage attacks and further extortion, saying:

     "My decision was that I would spend a lot of money to bring the hackers to justice. Our track record shows that we have done it before, and based on this track record, I am very confident that we can do it again."

     Taheri said the attackers had threatened to take the company's website offline for the entire day (Wednesday, October 21) if a ransom was not received.

     Aria Technology's website was back online at press time.

Bitcoin Ransom

     Earlier this year, the ransomware group DD4BC made headlines when it appeared to be linked to a series of DDoS attacks against organizations in Switzerland, New Zealand, and Australia. At the time, the group demanded a ransom of 25 Bitcoins.

     A report released in September by Akamai Technologies, a content delivery network and cloud services provider, found 114 attacks carried out by DD4BC since April.

     Earlier this year, two of Hong Kong’s largest banks also suffered DDoS attacks and faced ransom demands in Bitcoin.