________ are an additional layer of compromised hosts that are used to manage large groups of bots.

• A. Botnets
• B. Handlers
• C. Phatbots
• D. None of the above

Answer: (B)

In botnet designs, there is an intermediate layer of compromised hosts called handlers that is used to manage large groups of bots. Bots receive commands from a command-and-control framework, but to scale control, attackers deploy these handlers as intermediaries. The handlers collect instructions from the botmaster or central C2 and relay them out to many bots, making distribution faster, easier to coordinate, and more resilient against takedowns. This separation helps hide the actual master and allows the attacker to balance loads across the network. The term botnet refers to the entire network of infected machines, not this intermediate layer, and phatbots isn’t a standard term for this concept. So the described layer is handlers.