botnet
noun
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Definition of botnet
: a network of computers that have been linked together by malware : a network of bots (see bot entry 3 sense 2b) Criminals link hijacked personal computers together to form "botnets"—clusters of infected PCs that spammers can control from anywhere in the world.— Dave Mosher
Examples of botnet in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
The attack spreads a type of malware, known as VPNFilter, which can be used to coordinate the infected devices to create a massive botnet. — Lily Hay Newman, WIRED, "The Worst Cybersecurity Breaches of 2018 So Far," 9 July 2018 Millions of devices with little to no active maintenance are now permanently online, enabling the creation of massive botnets as the devices go unpatched and unloved. — Peter Bright, Ars Technica, "Microsoft’s bid to secure the Internet of Things: Custom Linux, custom chips, Azure," 16 Apr. 2018 Despite the discovery of VPNFilter and the FBI seizure two weeks ago of a key command and control server, the botnet still remains active, Williams said. — Dan Goodin, Ars Technica, "VPNFilter malware infecting 500,000 devices is worse than we thought," 6 June 2018 Unlike Wyoming, though, the internet still seems capable of blasting open new and dangerous frontiers, from botnet swarms to deep state hacks. — Jesse Jarnow, WIRED, "The Ghost of John Perry Barlow Lives in His Posthumous Memoir," 5 June 2018 The botnet then used that pilfered information to send links to friends of the infected person. — Dan Goodin, Ars Technica, "Malicious Chrome extensions infect 100,000-plus users, again," 10 May 2018 Curators can also identify the cultural flash points—the NFL, Colin Kaepernick, the memo—that fire people up, so botnets can ratchet up the velocity of the most incendiary memes. — Virginia Heffernan, WIRED, "Social Media Makes Us Soldiers in the War Against Ourselves," 2 May 2018 Beforehand the botnet had spent its time promoting pornography and commercial products. — The Economist, "Russian disinformation distorts American and European democracy," 24 Feb. 2018 JenX is an example of the second generation of IoT botnets. — Dan Goodin, Ars Technica, "New IoT botnet offers DDoSes of once-unimaginable sizes for $20," 1 Feb. 2018These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'botnet.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
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