Great article over at the Register which illustrates how important it is to mitigate threat with a well developed datacenter solution. As for the boy arrested, he very likely just became the next Kevin Mitnick, sans the 20-odd year illegal jailing :)

"The suspect was found with his computer systems open and logged on to various virtual systems and forums," says the police document shown to the London Evening Standard. "The subject has a significant amount of money flowing through his bank account. Financial investigators are in the process of restraining monies."

Check out the article here: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/09/27/london_schoolboy_arrested_for_biggest_ddos_attack_in_history/