Teen hacker goes to the house of detention

Jasmine Singh, 17, of Edison, New Jersey, admitted he caused attacks against the websites of jersey-joe.com, based in Delran, New Jersey and Distant Replays of Atlanta, Ga. Three other retailers were also thought to have suffered attacks. Singh was accused of launching more than 30 attacks of which he admitted to five.

Deputy State Attorney General Kenneth Sharpe said the attacks cost the victims more than $1.5 million through lost sales and getting websites back online.

Singh uses the botnets at the alleged bidding of 18-year-old Jason Arabo of Southfield, Michigan, to help give Arabo's rival website an advantage in selling his sporting goods, the court was told.

Botnets have been implicated in another court case. SC Magazine reported that adware company 180solutions is suing seven former distributors it claims used botnets to secretly install its software onto unsuspecting users' machines.