A brief description of Distributed Denial of Service attacks

by vishal tripathi Digital Markiting Expart

Distributed Denial of Service attack is referred to as a system or network crashing due to malicious code or unmanageable traffic. During the attack, the hacker sends enormous requests to the website than its capacity to handle and as a result of this it breaks down. The attackers often target financial companies, banks, and websites handling a huge amount of database so that removing and storing the previous stage consumes most of the time and money. The attack can be aimed with an intention to destroy a reputation, gain finances, or revenge.

It is very easy to detect even without the help of any pc security software. If you come across the site’s slow loading, crashing on regular basis, or traffic is suddenly increased as compared to the regular reports then surely the website is under a DDoS attack. This kind of attack is generally launched by an army of zombies that was made by the Botnet attack.

The DDoS attack can be broadly classified into 3 categories-

1. Attack at the application layer- Theses attacks are slow and mainly target the windows or Apache server. The attacks are made by genuine requests at a very high rate of request per second (Rps). When the rate crosses the threshold the server breaks down.

2. Attacks based on volume- In this attack, the website is flooded with spooky requests in order to break the saturation level which is calculated at the rate if bits per second (Bps).

3. Protocol attacks- In this attack, the resources of the server are consuming in the form of packets and the depth of the attack is measured in packet per second (Pps).

Challenges of DDoS attacks

The DDoS can affect the website and the server very abruptly. Following are the challenges faced in its removal,

• The attacker can use huge amounts of zombie systems to execute the attack with devastating consequences.

• Since the attack is from multiple systems, breaking down each system can be a time consuming and difficult task.

• The attack is made from a number of devices, therefore, figuring out the location becomes a tedious task with no start point.

• The bot network also makes it almost impossible to identify the mastermind of the attack.

Removal of DDoS attack

The attack can be removed in the following ways,

• It is good if the attack gets identified at a very early stage.

• Have more bandwidth for the server to have increased capacity to bear the load.

• Always be on a look out of your network parameter.

• Inform the hosting provider if you are under an attack

• If you are under a huge attack then call the specialists of Distributed Denial of Service companies.

Prevention of DDoS

Prevention of the attack is hardly possible because it happens all of a sudden and admin of the website or server does not regularly check the traffic flood mark. However, individual can prevent themselves from the Botnet malware thus, eliminating a certain amount of percentage of being under attack. In order to eliminate the botnet malware, one must have installed the best computer protection software and keep the software as well as the system updated.