Conficker variants continue evolving. The original variant from November has been followed by Conficker B (December 2008), Conficker C (March 2009), and specific subsequent variants are emerging. Industry coordination around DGA-prediction and sinkholing has produced operational defensive response; specific subsequent variants are adapting.
This is a longer post because the cumulative trajectory illustrates structural patterns of bot-defence evolution.
What has changed
The cumulative variant evolution since November:
Conficker B (late December 2008) added specific propagation refinements. Faster scanning, additional propagation paths, specific anti-detection improvements. The cumulative population of Conficker-compromised hosts grew substantially during this period.
Conficker C (March 2009) added substantial architectural changes in response to defensive activity. Specific subsequent properties:
- Increased the DGA domain space from 250/day to 50,000/day. Defensive sinkholing of all 50,000 daily candidates is operationally infeasible; the cumulative defensive response is bounded.
- Added peer-to-peer command-and-control as fallback to DGA. Specific subsequent capability for command without successful DNS lookup.
- Specific cumulative cumulative additional anti-debugging and anti-analysis features.
- Specific cumulative cumulative specific date-based behaviour for 1 April 2009 (the cumulative variant adjusts behaviour on this date).
The cumulative trajectory: Conficker authors are responding to defensive activity. Specific subsequent variants adapt; specific cumulative defensive response must continue evolving.
The 1 April deadline
Specific media attention has focused on Conficker C's 1 April behaviour. The cumulative speculation has produced substantial public interest; specific operators are bracing for a "doomsday" event.
The structural reality is bounded. The 1 April behaviour involves Conficker C activating its updated DGA and command-and-control infrastructure; specific operators tracking the variant know what to expect; specific operational response is in place.
The likely outcome: 1 April will be a non-event from the public-spectacle perspective. Specific Conficker C will activate its updated infrastructure; specific cumulative subsequent operational response will continue; specific cumulative defensive activity will adapt.
The cumulative narrative around 1 April has been useful for raising public awareness but has misrepresented the operational reality. The cumulative threat from Conficker is sustained, not punctuated.
Industry coordination
Specific cumulative industry coordination has been substantive.
The Conficker Working Group brings together specific researchers, specific industry participants, specific government agencies, specific registrars, specific carriers. The cumulative cumulative coordination addresses DGA-prediction, domain-registration coordination, sinkhole operation, victim notification.
Specific cumulative cumulative DGA-prediction. Specific researchers compute the same domains Conficker generates; specific cumulative pre-registration of these domains by defensive parties prevents Conficker authors from operationally using them.
Specific cumulative cumulative cumulative sinkhole operation. Specific cumulative pre-registered domains route Conficker-infected hosts' command-and-control attempts to defensive infrastructure; specific cumulative cumulative observation of sinkholed traffic provides intelligence about the cumulative compromised population.
Specific cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative information sharing. Specific cumulative cumulative practitioner network and specific cumulative cumulative formal industry channels share specific cumulative cumulative threat intelligence about Conficker activity.
The cumulative effect: substantial defensive disruption of Conficker command-and-control. Specific cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative effect on the operational botnet is bounded but real.
What this teaches structurally
Three observations.
Bot-defence has matured into operational coordination. Specific cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative industry coordination structures are now operational; specific cumulative cumulative subsequent threats can leverage similar coordination.
The arms race continues. Specific cumulative subsequent variants will continue adapting; specific cumulative cumulative defensive infrastructure must continue evolving. The cumulative trajectory is sustained rather than terminal.
Specific cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative information sharing produces cumulative cumulative defensive value. Specific operators who participate in coordination structures produce better cumulative outcomes than operators who do not.
What I am doing
For Gala Coral: continued attention to Conficker-related signal in network monitoring. The cumulative defensive infrastructure has produced bounded internal compromise.
For my own continued writing: continued tracking of Conficker. The cumulative archive grows.
What I am paying attention to
Three things over the next several months.
Specific cumulative subsequent variants. 95% probability. The Conficker authors will continue iterating.
Specific cumulative cumulative subsequent industry coordination. 85% probability of sustained operational coordination. The cumulative working-group infrastructure is now established.
Specific cumulative cumulative cumulative cumulative bot-architecture trajectory. 80% probability of specific cumulative subsequent architectural shifts. Bot architectures will continue evolving in response to defensive activity.
For my own continued operation: the discipline continues. The cumulative archive grows.
More in time.