What term refers to a coordinated network of infected machines used to carry out attacks?

• A. DDoS
• B. Domain
• C. Botnet
• D. Encryption

Answer: (C)

The concept being tested is naming the coordinated network of compromised machines used to carry out attacks. A botnet is a group of devices that have been infected and are remotely controlled by an attacker, typically via a command-and-control infrastructure. This network can be marshaled to perform various malicious actions, with distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks being a common example where many bots flood a target with traffic. But DDoS describes the attack itself, not the network of infected devices. The other terms don’t fit: a domain is just a naming space on the Internet, and encryption is a cryptographic method to protect data, not a network of compromised machines.