It's A Trap! Preparing For Smokescreen DDoS Attacks

By Rene Paap, Product Marketing Manager, A10 Networks

The threat landscape is more complex than ever, and establishing a cybersecurity strategy in 2016 entails accounting for a number of different factors. Hackers will employ a variety of techniques to achieve their goals. In order to establish a viable defense, enterprises and VARs must select the necessary technology for countering different forms of attacks.

One of the most prevalent methods used by cybercriminals is the distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack. This form of attack generates massive amounts of malicious network traffic — usually via networks of infected devices controlled by a single user. Due to the highly visible repercussions of DDoS attacks, they are carried out for a large number of reasons, including political activism, financial gain, and even ransom. DDoS attacks are becoming an increasingly popular tool in the cybercrime arsenal, and a 2015 Akamai report shows that DDoS attacks increased by 132 percent compared to Q2 2014. In addition, a 2015 Verisign report found that attack sizes increased by 52 percent from the first to the second quarter, meaning not only are more attacks happening, but they are becoming more severe.

DDoS attacks can range in terms of severity, partially due to the low technical barriers posed to individuals carrying them out. One such popular method is via Web services that allow customers to rent, in a DDoS-as-a-Service manner, the computing power necessary to generate sufficient Web traffic — meaning anyone with a credit card could carry out an attack.

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