Shellbot malware now shuts down other cryptominers

When hackers want to make a quick buck, mining cryptocurrency seems to be the way to go.

New research out Wednesday by Boston-based security firm Threat Stack shared exclusively with TechCrunch reveals a new variant of the Shellbot malware is taking a leaf out of the other cryptocurrency mining by breaking into computers and using their resources to make money.

Shellbot, first written about by Jask in February, now uses an old but reliable SSH brute force technique to break into internet-connected Linux servers with weak passwords to infect a system and mine cryptocurrency.

But now, Threat Stack says, the malware has new capabilities, allowing it to spread through a network and shut down other cryptominers on infected computers, allowing the malware to free up more processing power for its own cryptomining o