Botnet Identification and Challenges

Serious problems are becoming more transparent in this digital world giving rise to various threats. Botnets are the imminent among the various threats in cyber security. They are group of compromised nodes, in other words bots which are remotely commanded by its controller (Bot Master). This scheme is a typical Command-and-Control (C&C) infrastructure. Various Internet attacks, including spam, distributed denial-of-service (DDoS), phishing, malware dissemination and identity theft are facilitated through Botnets. This paper provides an overview of Botnets and latest advances in Botnet detection research. It classifies Botnet detection techniques into two approaches. One approach is based on setting up Honey nets and another approach is based on Intrusion Detection System (IDS). Peer to Peer Botnet consists of only two nodes and they are harder to detect than the normal Botnets. This paper also presents various remedies to the Botnet threats and also paves way for future directions for Botnet detection research.