2 Minute Drill: How a 22-Year-Old Took Down the World's Largest Botnet with Drex DeFord

The Kim Wolf botnet was the most powerful ever built — 2 million compromised IoT devices, a record-breaking 31.4 terabit DDoS attack, and it had the FBI, Google, and Cloudflare stumped. Drex breaks down how those cheap, forgotten devices in patient waiting rooms and break rooms became weapons inside hospital networks, and why 25% of Infoblox's enterprise healthcare clients were already compromised. Then comes the wild part: a 22-year-old RIT undergrad named Benjamin cracked the whole operation — while studying for midterms — using Discord, Telegram, and a perfectly timed cat meme. His research ultimately fueled a coordinated takedown on March 19th, 2026, that brought Kim Wolf from 2 million active devices to roughly 30,000. The lesson for healthcare: those forgotten IoT devices on your network aren't harmless. They're potential soldiers in someone else's army.Remember, Stay a Little Paranoid X: This Week Health LinkedIn: This Week Health Donate: Alex’s Lemonade Stand: Foundation for Childhood Cancer