Online fraudsters that aren't highly skilled in the arts of cybercrime can now rent a service that offers an all-in-one hosting server with a built-in Zeus trojan administration panel and infecting tools, allowing them to create their own botnet.

EMC's security division, the RSA Anti-Fraud Command Centre (AFCC), cited an increase in the use of the Zeus trojan in attacks against financial institutions in its April online fraud report, claiming the trojan is "extremely user friendly and easy to operate".

"Fraudsters who execute Zeus attacks simply need to take control of a compromised server or have their own back-end servers; once they have a server in place, they merely need to install the Zeus administration panel, create a user name and password, and start launching their attacks," the report stated.

But the AFCC recently traced a new service that does all of the above for would be botnet barons. The service offers access to a "bullet-proof hosting server with a built-in Zeus trojan administration panel and infection tools...the service includes all of the required stages in a single package, meaning that all the fraudster now has to do is pay for the service, access the newly-hired Zeus trojan server, create infection points and start collecting data".

RSA's banking and finance specialist, Geoff Noble, said that those offering the Zeus package are mirroring what legitimate security vendors are offering -- security-as-a-service -- but in their case they are slinging malware-as-a-service.

"Phase one of online threats was stealing credit card numbers, buying stuff on the internet and selling it somewhere else to make a profit. Phase two is this grabbing of user names and passwords online, phase two 'b' is productizing that solution, and phase 2 'c' is offering that solution as a service," Noble said.

"What Zeus means is that you are buying a service with traditional software support and maintenance, so you can go about your business without updating and patching."

RSA said that the exploit package allows fraudsters to easily infect users and grow a botnet of compromised machines, and boasts an easy to use Web hosting control panel that can be used by virtually anyone.

"The bottom line is that with such services, creating the infrastructure for Zeus attacks and actually implementing these attacks is now easier than ever before", the report said.

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