This article details the processes, systems, and prevention measures involved in a Distributed Denial of Service attack, or DDoS. My takeaway from this, having read Boyle and Panko and knowing that DDoS attacks are some of the most common when it comes to targeting network vulnerabilities, it made sense to see how many layers there are in the attack itself. Not only does the attacker utilize various handlers to obfuscate their identity, but as the chart shows, the separation and distribution of compromised devices and requests multiplies as it advances between various layers. Doing so allows attackers to not only more effectively target and disrupt devices, but also to more effectively hide their identities in the event that the attack is detected and traced, which makes it both convenient and relatively secure
Andrew, you are right about the number of layers involved in carrying out a successful DDOS. The scary part is the idea that infected computers (botnets) can be controlled from a command-and-control center without the knowledge of the legitimate owners of the devices. The larger the botnet, the more difficult it will be to find out where the main attacker is located.
Yes, this anonymity is almost certainly why people use this method commonly. Allowing an attacker to not only cripple a system, but to do so anonymously and with little risk of retribution is a frightening concept, and with not only the availability of the software and means to attack, but also the effectiveness of it make DDoS attacks a significant risk for any organization. Being able to accurately predict where or when these attacks will occur is therefor difficult given these risks, so as security professionals the optimal way of dealing with them would likely be to treat them as an inevitability and prepare for the worst
This article was simple to read and had easy to understand visuals. It shows up to five components of a DDoS where a computer “attacks” other machines reflecting to other machines and then “floods” your network the put a choke hold on traffic, typically a web server or host website. The diagram is when I really liked about the site as it provides a visual to how DDoS attacks may look.
This provides a comprehensive overview of the menacing threat posed by Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. DDoS attacks leverage a network of compromised devices to flood a target server or network with overwhelming traffic, rendering it inaccessible to legitimate users. Boyle and Panko dissect the intricate workings of these attacks, from the methods used to recruit botnets to the strategies employed to amplify the assault’s impact.
It also underscore the alarming proliferation of DDoS attacks in recent years, driven by the increasing interconnectedness of digital infrastructure and the growing sophistication of cybercriminals. Through insightful analysis, they illuminate the various motivations behind DDoS attacks, which range from ideological agendas to financial gain.
Furthermore, the article delineate effective mitigation techniques, emphasizing the importance of proactive defense strategies and collaboration among stakeholders to fortify resilience against such attacks. Their work serves as a vital resource for cybersecurity professionals, policymakers, and anyone seeking to grasp the intricacies of DDoS attacks in the modern digital landscape.
Ikenna your grasp of the threats posed by DDoS attacks, as outlined in the textbook is spot on, the increasing prevalence and sophistication of these attacks does raise concerns for both everyday users as well as large organizations. Considering how rapidly we’re advancing with cyber attacks, what proactive defense strategies do you find particularly crucial in mitigating the impact of these attacks and how do you think collaboration among stakeholders/partner organizations can be enhanced to fortify resilience and create a more robust defense?
My interpretation of the critical evaluation of these basic ideas from the paper “An Introduction to DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) Attacks” . DDoS attacks are a serious security risk, and protecting networks requires an awareness of them. Following are the key conclusions:
DOS
Definition of DDoS Attacks: DDoS attacks are designed to overload a target system or network by sending an excessive amount of traffic over it.
DDoS attacks, in contrast to standard DoS attacks, entail the coordinated initiation of an attack by a number of infected machines (often a botnet).
The intention is to interfere with services so that authorized users are unable to access them.
Damage as well as Adjustment Challenges: DDoS assaults have the potential to seriously harm systems, affecting their performance and availability.
Because DDoS attacks are spread, mitigating them might be difficult.
To further add to your points DDoS attacks also target mostly high profile servers of financial institutions. I also read that DDoS attacks are sometimes motivated by blackmail, hacktivism, or revenge. Great points, it helps me to think of DDoS attacks from a different point of view.
Great Job Michael,
Your interpretation of the critical evaluation of DDoS attacks aligns with the paper’s key conclusions. Emphasizing the distinction between DoS and DDoS attacks, you highlight the coordinated nature of DDoS, often involving a botnet. The intention to disrupt services and impede authorized user access is a key aspect, underscoring the severity of these attacks. Furthermore, your recognition of the potential for serious damage to systems and the challenges in mitigating DDoS due to their distributed nature effectively captures the essence of the security risks associated with such attacks. Overall, your summary provides a concise and accurate overview of the critical points from the paper.
DDoS attacks are carefully planned attacks. They’re designed to hide who’s behind them and make it hard to trace them back to the attacker. The author illustrates how attackers employ multiple layers to evade direct connections to their victims by leveraging intermediary devices.
I liked that this article explored various techniques to identify and prevent DDOS attacks. I think continuous monitoring is very crucial for catching any unusual behavior early on. The author mentioned things like load balancing and rate throttling would help minimize the effect of DDOS, I also think network segmentation would help also, segmenting critical services from the rest of the infrastructure would help contain the impact of DDOS and prevent them from affecting the rest of the network.
I agree with you Mariam, DDoS attacks are meticulously orchestrated, obscuring the perpetrator’s identity and thwarting tracking efforts. The author expertly elucidates how assailants employ intricate stratifications, obfuscating direct victim-connectivity by manipulating intermediary devices.
Mariam, I agree and it’s worth noting that the field of cybersecurity, including DDoS mitigation techniques, has evolved rapidly over the past decade. Innovations such as advanced behavioral analytics, AI-driven threat detection, and more sophisticated cloud-based DDoS protection services have been developed since 2011.
An Introduction to DDoS Distributed Denial of Service Attack
I found it interesting that, “there are no fixed IP addresses for the zombie computer that connects to the internet using and even some of the attacking zombies’ computers are identified and blocked and more computers can always be summoned by the attacker”. The IP can then sometimes spoof the address of the victim server and send requests to a large number of reflector computers. This then has large packets reply to victim services as they need to reply back to all requests from what it thinks is the originator. WOW that is interesting but makes sense why it wouldn’t be a fixed IP, I assume so if you need to refresh it, then you have more flexibility and less change of tracking?
The article then goes over the two types of DDos attacks, which are attacks against networks and how they choke the bandwidth and attacks that target vulnerabilities in applications. It then identifies several steps you can take in preventing and mitigating DDos attacks. These steps include: looking for and identifying statistical pattern of DDos attacks, filtering illegitimate traffic, having alternative network paths and applying load balancing, rate limiting or throttling traffic, setting up honeypots which includes the setting up of dummy servers with maximum vulnerabilities that are exposed to hackers as legitimate servers.
Has anyone ever been a victim to a DDos attack, or have you managed a network to help defend against an attack?
I have not had the opportunity to first have experience to defend against DoS but this chapter and article has equipped me with the knowledge I’ll need to make informed decisions to effectively defend against DDoS when I get the opportunity to do so.
The introduction to DDoS attacks offers a detailed examination of the phenomenon, its intricacies, and mitigation strategies. It begins with a notable incident involving WordPress.com, illustrating the disruptive potential of DDoS attacks. A key point of interest is the explanation of how DDoS attacks leverage zombie computers, often without the owners’ knowledge, to inundate targeted servers with data, thus hindering legitimate user access. Additionally, the introduction outlines the architecture of DDoS attacks, emphasizing the challenge in tracing attackers due to the dynamic nature of IP addresses and the sophistication of attack techniques. Notably, it categorizes DDoS attacks into network-based and application-based, illustrating different methods attackers employ to overwhelm systems. Furthermore, it provides insightful prevention and mitigation strategies, such as identifying statistical patterns, implementing rate-limiting, and utilizing honeypots, highlighting the importance of proactive defense mechanisms in combating these threats. This comprehensive overview underscores the multifaceted nature of DDoS attacks and the critical importance of robust defense strategies in safeguarding against them.
I like how you described the nature of DDoS attacks essentially being “zombie” computers that attackers leverage to attack victims with. Attackers utilize a Command and Control center which can manage large numbers of infected computers that are often times not known by the owner to be infected. These Command and Control centers can then command all of the infected computers simultaneously to attack one designated target to overload the hardware on a system to take it down.
First of all I just want to say what an amazing resource this little intro is as its a condensed straight to the point informative article that serves as a great introduction to DDoS and its various types. The most interesting part to me comes in the prevention/mitigation section where they list Honeypots as potential mitigation for DDoS attacks its an interesting idea but probably not practical for most organizations to just have full dummy servers that are constantly monitored and studied. Although I also like the most simple approach of just having additional resources ready at a moments notice for load balancing despite this not working against large scale DDoS attacks it prevents most small scale attacks.
We both wrote about the use of honeypots for DDoS attacks but you bring up an interesting point on how impractical they are for organizations since they are basically fake servers being hosted and up kept that need to be monitored. Depending on how much you want to mimic a real system in an organization affects how effective and how expensive a honeypot is as well as the maintenance. However, with the use of AI, it should make some aspects like monitoring and response to threats on honeypot servers more automated which can offset some of the manual cost of the servers.
An Introduction to DDoS – Distributed Denial of Service attack is an article outlining the definition of DDoS attacks as well as the difficulties in detection, mitigation, the types of attacks, and steps for prevention and mitigation. One key takeaway form the article I got was from the steps for prevention and mitigation, specifically the use of honeypots. Honeypots are fake servers that are hosted by an organization to entice hackers to attack the resources with their information being exposed as well as the types of attacks they used being found out. Although an interesting solution to DDoS to learn attack patterns, there are legal/ethical risks associated with their use such as some privacy laws as well as the concept of entrapment being involved when utilizing honeypots.
This post, although written almost 13 years ago (Cloudflare was barely a year old,) is still relevant and provides an excellent introduction to Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. The post explains the mechanisms of DDoS attacks, the difficulties in detecting and mitigating them, and the different types of DDoS attacks. It also illustrates how DDoS attacks use compromised computers to overwhelm victims’ servers with excessive traffic, making services unavailable to legitimate users. The article also highlights the challenges in tracing these attacks due to the use of innocent users’ computers. It suggests several strategies for prevention and mitigation, including traffic analysis, load balancing, and using honeypots to study attack patterns.
Finding out how unaware users’ PCs might be used as “zombie computers” in a DDoS attack was an intriguing discovery. These machines are frequently taken over by malicious software, which is then used to overload the DDoS victim’s servers with data so that other users are unable to use its services. While it might be challenging to counteract DDoS attacks, some useful strategies are traffic pattern recognition, load balancing and alternate network channel creation, and restricting the maximum amount of incoming traffic.
Hi Samuel,
I also find it fascinating how DDOS can disrupt a network. Organizations should have programs that monitor the traffic flow of a network to detect DDOS attack. It is also important for organizations to train employees regarding security measures. If employees are well trained, they will know to use strong password and not to click on unrecognize links.
This writing describes the intricate processes involved in executing a successful Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attack. The goal of the attacker is to overwhelm a target server with a flood of data, rendering it inaccessible to legitimate users. This is orchestrated using a network of compromised computers, known as zombies/botnets, controlled by the attacker. In some cases, attacks aim to disrupt services rather than completely shut them down. DDoS attacks consist of 4 to 5 components – the attacker’s computer, the victim server, zombies, handlers, and reflectors.
There are two main types of DDoS attacks: network-based attacks that flood the victim’s bandwidth, and application-based attacks that exploit vulnerabilities to exhaust server resources like CPU and RAM. For instance, DNS attacks flood the network, while Syn Flood attacks overwhelm applications with open connections.
Preventing and mitigating DDoS attacks is challenging but feasible. Techniques include identifying attack patterns, implementing traffic filtering, utilizing alternate network paths, rate-limiting incoming traffic, deploying honeypots to study attack patterns, and employing aggressive caching to handle smaller attacks more efficiently.
I agree with you Chidiebere, I think DDoS shows how much these attacks are evolving and how much work hackers put into covering their tracks and avoiding evasion. Certainly, these mitigations will help minimize the impacts of DDoS.
On top of this weeks textbook reading and now this article, I can say that DoS attacks are much easier for me to understand. I also appreciate this article going into DDoS attacks, specifically ways to mitigate this from happening. One method that stuck out to me is honeypots. It notes that many organizations don’t use this, but I would think it would benefit corporations greatly if they used this. I assume what happens is companies don’t see the point in using one as they may go off of data collected from other honeypots. My rebuttal to that would be different areas and different companies have different ways of being attacked. An attacker may breach into a honeypot server based in Norway differently than a honeypot server based in the UK. Countries aside, even the type of company could be breached in it’s own unique way. By having each company set up their own honeypot, it can allow them to have a clear understanding of how an attacker views their servers.
This reading provides insight regarding DDOS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack. With DDOS attacks, various compromised nodes are used to attack a server to overwhelm it and make it unavailable for users. To avoid DDOS attacks, it is important to educate users to be able to recognize the attack. If users are educated regarding network security, they will be able to identify and eventually prevent attacks.
Andrew Young says
This article details the processes, systems, and prevention measures involved in a Distributed Denial of Service attack, or DDoS. My takeaway from this, having read Boyle and Panko and knowing that DDoS attacks are some of the most common when it comes to targeting network vulnerabilities, it made sense to see how many layers there are in the attack itself. Not only does the attacker utilize various handlers to obfuscate their identity, but as the chart shows, the separation and distribution of compromised devices and requests multiplies as it advances between various layers. Doing so allows attackers to not only more effectively target and disrupt devices, but also to more effectively hide their identities in the event that the attack is detected and traced, which makes it both convenient and relatively secure
Chidiebere Okafor says
Andrew, you are right about the number of layers involved in carrying out a successful DDOS. The scary part is the idea that infected computers (botnets) can be controlled from a command-and-control center without the knowledge of the legitimate owners of the devices. The larger the botnet, the more difficult it will be to find out where the main attacker is located.
Andrew Young says
Yes, this anonymity is almost certainly why people use this method commonly. Allowing an attacker to not only cripple a system, but to do so anonymously and with little risk of retribution is a frightening concept, and with not only the availability of the software and means to attack, but also the effectiveness of it make DDoS attacks a significant risk for any organization. Being able to accurately predict where or when these attacks will occur is therefor difficult given these risks, so as security professionals the optimal way of dealing with them would likely be to treat them as an inevitability and prepare for the worst
Erskine Payton says
This article was simple to read and had easy to understand visuals. It shows up to five components of a DDoS where a computer “attacks” other machines reflecting to other machines and then “floods” your network the put a choke hold on traffic, typically a web server or host website. The diagram is when I really liked about the site as it provides a visual to how DDoS attacks may look.
Michael Obiukwu says
Hi Erskine,
Your comment here further highlights the the primary reason for DDOS which is to attack the availabiity of of information accept..
Ikenna Alajemba says
This provides a comprehensive overview of the menacing threat posed by Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. DDoS attacks leverage a network of compromised devices to flood a target server or network with overwhelming traffic, rendering it inaccessible to legitimate users. Boyle and Panko dissect the intricate workings of these attacks, from the methods used to recruit botnets to the strategies employed to amplify the assault’s impact.
It also underscore the alarming proliferation of DDoS attacks in recent years, driven by the increasing interconnectedness of digital infrastructure and the growing sophistication of cybercriminals. Through insightful analysis, they illuminate the various motivations behind DDoS attacks, which range from ideological agendas to financial gain.
Furthermore, the article delineate effective mitigation techniques, emphasizing the importance of proactive defense strategies and collaboration among stakeholders to fortify resilience against such attacks. Their work serves as a vital resource for cybersecurity professionals, policymakers, and anyone seeking to grasp the intricacies of DDoS attacks in the modern digital landscape.
Alex Ruiz says
Ikenna your grasp of the threats posed by DDoS attacks, as outlined in the textbook is spot on, the increasing prevalence and sophistication of these attacks does raise concerns for both everyday users as well as large organizations. Considering how rapidly we’re advancing with cyber attacks, what proactive defense strategies do you find particularly crucial in mitigating the impact of these attacks and how do you think collaboration among stakeholders/partner organizations can be enhanced to fortify resilience and create a more robust defense?
Michael Obiukwu says
My interpretation of the critical evaluation of these basic ideas from the paper “An Introduction to DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) Attacks” . DDoS attacks are a serious security risk, and protecting networks requires an awareness of them. Following are the key conclusions:
DOS
Definition of DDoS Attacks: DDoS attacks are designed to overload a target system or network by sending an excessive amount of traffic over it.
DDoS attacks, in contrast to standard DoS attacks, entail the coordinated initiation of an attack by a number of infected machines (often a botnet).
The intention is to interfere with services so that authorized users are unable to access them.
Damage as well as Adjustment Challenges: DDoS assaults have the potential to seriously harm systems, affecting their performance and availability.
Because DDoS attacks are spread, mitigating them might be difficult.
Erskine Payton says
To further add to your points DDoS attacks also target mostly high profile servers of financial institutions. I also read that DDoS attacks are sometimes motivated by blackmail, hacktivism, or revenge. Great points, it helps me to think of DDoS attacks from a different point of view.
Samuel Omotosho says
Great Job Michael,
Your interpretation of the critical evaluation of DDoS attacks aligns with the paper’s key conclusions. Emphasizing the distinction between DoS and DDoS attacks, you highlight the coordinated nature of DDoS, often involving a botnet. The intention to disrupt services and impede authorized user access is a key aspect, underscoring the severity of these attacks. Furthermore, your recognition of the potential for serious damage to systems and the challenges in mitigating DDoS due to their distributed nature effectively captures the essence of the security risks associated with such attacks. Overall, your summary provides a concise and accurate overview of the critical points from the paper.
Mariam Hazali says
DDoS attacks are carefully planned attacks. They’re designed to hide who’s behind them and make it hard to trace them back to the attacker. The author illustrates how attackers employ multiple layers to evade direct connections to their victims by leveraging intermediary devices.
I liked that this article explored various techniques to identify and prevent DDOS attacks. I think continuous monitoring is very crucial for catching any unusual behavior early on. The author mentioned things like load balancing and rate throttling would help minimize the effect of DDOS, I also think network segmentation would help also, segmenting critical services from the rest of the infrastructure would help contain the impact of DDOS and prevent them from affecting the rest of the network.
Ikenna Alajemba says
I agree with you Mariam, DDoS attacks are meticulously orchestrated, obscuring the perpetrator’s identity and thwarting tracking efforts. The author expertly elucidates how assailants employ intricate stratifications, obfuscating direct victim-connectivity by manipulating intermediary devices.
Kelly Conger says
Mariam, I agree and it’s worth noting that the field of cybersecurity, including DDoS mitigation techniques, has evolved rapidly over the past decade. Innovations such as advanced behavioral analytics, AI-driven threat detection, and more sophisticated cloud-based DDoS protection services have been developed since 2011.
Jeffrey Sullivan says
An Introduction to DDoS Distributed Denial of Service Attack
I found it interesting that, “there are no fixed IP addresses for the zombie computer that connects to the internet using and even some of the attacking zombies’ computers are identified and blocked and more computers can always be summoned by the attacker”. The IP can then sometimes spoof the address of the victim server and send requests to a large number of reflector computers. This then has large packets reply to victim services as they need to reply back to all requests from what it thinks is the originator. WOW that is interesting but makes sense why it wouldn’t be a fixed IP, I assume so if you need to refresh it, then you have more flexibility and less change of tracking?
The article then goes over the two types of DDos attacks, which are attacks against networks and how they choke the bandwidth and attacks that target vulnerabilities in applications. It then identifies several steps you can take in preventing and mitigating DDos attacks. These steps include: looking for and identifying statistical pattern of DDos attacks, filtering illegitimate traffic, having alternative network paths and applying load balancing, rate limiting or throttling traffic, setting up honeypots which includes the setting up of dummy servers with maximum vulnerabilities that are exposed to hackers as legitimate servers.
Has anyone ever been a victim to a DDos attack, or have you managed a network to help defend against an attack?
Mariam Hazali says
I have not had the opportunity to first have experience to defend against DoS but this chapter and article has equipped me with the knowledge I’ll need to make informed decisions to effectively defend against DDoS when I get the opportunity to do so.
Nicholas Nirenberg says
The introduction to DDoS attacks offers a detailed examination of the phenomenon, its intricacies, and mitigation strategies. It begins with a notable incident involving WordPress.com, illustrating the disruptive potential of DDoS attacks. A key point of interest is the explanation of how DDoS attacks leverage zombie computers, often without the owners’ knowledge, to inundate targeted servers with data, thus hindering legitimate user access. Additionally, the introduction outlines the architecture of DDoS attacks, emphasizing the challenge in tracing attackers due to the dynamic nature of IP addresses and the sophistication of attack techniques. Notably, it categorizes DDoS attacks into network-based and application-based, illustrating different methods attackers employ to overwhelm systems. Furthermore, it provides insightful prevention and mitigation strategies, such as identifying statistical patterns, implementing rate-limiting, and utilizing honeypots, highlighting the importance of proactive defense mechanisms in combating these threats. This comprehensive overview underscores the multifaceted nature of DDoS attacks and the critical importance of robust defense strategies in safeguarding against them.
Kenneth Saltisky says
Hi Nicholas,
I like how you described the nature of DDoS attacks essentially being “zombie” computers that attackers leverage to attack victims with. Attackers utilize a Command and Control center which can manage large numbers of infected computers that are often times not known by the owner to be infected. These Command and Control centers can then command all of the infected computers simultaneously to attack one designated target to overload the hardware on a system to take it down.
Alex Ruiz says
First of all I just want to say what an amazing resource this little intro is as its a condensed straight to the point informative article that serves as a great introduction to DDoS and its various types. The most interesting part to me comes in the prevention/mitigation section where they list Honeypots as potential mitigation for DDoS attacks its an interesting idea but probably not practical for most organizations to just have full dummy servers that are constantly monitored and studied. Although I also like the most simple approach of just having additional resources ready at a moments notice for load balancing despite this not working against large scale DDoS attacks it prevents most small scale attacks.
Kenneth Saltisky says
Hey Alex,
We both wrote about the use of honeypots for DDoS attacks but you bring up an interesting point on how impractical they are for organizations since they are basically fake servers being hosted and up kept that need to be monitored. Depending on how much you want to mimic a real system in an organization affects how effective and how expensive a honeypot is as well as the maintenance. However, with the use of AI, it should make some aspects like monitoring and response to threats on honeypot servers more automated which can offset some of the manual cost of the servers.
Kenneth Saltisky says
An Introduction to DDoS – Distributed Denial of Service attack is an article outlining the definition of DDoS attacks as well as the difficulties in detection, mitigation, the types of attacks, and steps for prevention and mitigation. One key takeaway form the article I got was from the steps for prevention and mitigation, specifically the use of honeypots. Honeypots are fake servers that are hosted by an organization to entice hackers to attack the resources with their information being exposed as well as the types of attacks they used being found out. Although an interesting solution to DDoS to learn attack patterns, there are legal/ethical risks associated with their use such as some privacy laws as well as the concept of entrapment being involved when utilizing honeypots.
Kelly Conger says
This post, although written almost 13 years ago (Cloudflare was barely a year old,) is still relevant and provides an excellent introduction to Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. The post explains the mechanisms of DDoS attacks, the difficulties in detecting and mitigating them, and the different types of DDoS attacks. It also illustrates how DDoS attacks use compromised computers to overwhelm victims’ servers with excessive traffic, making services unavailable to legitimate users. The article also highlights the challenges in tracing these attacks due to the use of innocent users’ computers. It suggests several strategies for prevention and mitigation, including traffic analysis, load balancing, and using honeypots to study attack patterns.
Samuel Omotosho says
Finding out how unaware users’ PCs might be used as “zombie computers” in a DDoS attack was an intriguing discovery. These machines are frequently taken over by malicious software, which is then used to overload the DDoS victim’s servers with data so that other users are unable to use its services. While it might be challenging to counteract DDoS attacks, some useful strategies are traffic pattern recognition, load balancing and alternate network channel creation, and restricting the maximum amount of incoming traffic.
Akintunde Akinmusire says
Hi Samuel,
I also find it fascinating how DDOS can disrupt a network. Organizations should have programs that monitor the traffic flow of a network to detect DDOS attack. It is also important for organizations to train employees regarding security measures. If employees are well trained, they will know to use strong password and not to click on unrecognize links.
Chidiebere Okafor says
This writing describes the intricate processes involved in executing a successful Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attack. The goal of the attacker is to overwhelm a target server with a flood of data, rendering it inaccessible to legitimate users. This is orchestrated using a network of compromised computers, known as zombies/botnets, controlled by the attacker. In some cases, attacks aim to disrupt services rather than completely shut them down. DDoS attacks consist of 4 to 5 components – the attacker’s computer, the victim server, zombies, handlers, and reflectors.
There are two main types of DDoS attacks: network-based attacks that flood the victim’s bandwidth, and application-based attacks that exploit vulnerabilities to exhaust server resources like CPU and RAM. For instance, DNS attacks flood the network, while Syn Flood attacks overwhelm applications with open connections.
Preventing and mitigating DDoS attacks is challenging but feasible. Techniques include identifying attack patterns, implementing traffic filtering, utilizing alternate network paths, rate-limiting incoming traffic, deploying honeypots to study attack patterns, and employing aggressive caching to handle smaller attacks more efficiently.
Mariam Hazali says
I agree with you Chidiebere, I think DDoS shows how much these attacks are evolving and how much work hackers put into covering their tracks and avoiding evasion. Certainly, these mitigations will help minimize the impacts of DDoS.
Hashem Alsharif says
On top of this weeks textbook reading and now this article, I can say that DoS attacks are much easier for me to understand. I also appreciate this article going into DDoS attacks, specifically ways to mitigate this from happening. One method that stuck out to me is honeypots. It notes that many organizations don’t use this, but I would think it would benefit corporations greatly if they used this. I assume what happens is companies don’t see the point in using one as they may go off of data collected from other honeypots. My rebuttal to that would be different areas and different companies have different ways of being attacked. An attacker may breach into a honeypot server based in Norway differently than a honeypot server based in the UK. Countries aside, even the type of company could be breached in it’s own unique way. By having each company set up their own honeypot, it can allow them to have a clear understanding of how an attacker views their servers.
Akintunde Akinmusire says
This reading provides insight regarding DDOS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack. With DDOS attacks, various compromised nodes are used to attack a server to overwhelm it and make it unavailable for users. To avoid DDOS attacks, it is important to educate users to be able to recognize the attack. If users are educated regarding network security, they will be able to identify and eventually prevent attacks.