Uncovering the Devastating Effects Of a Denial-Of-Service Attack
By Tom Seest
What Is a Denial-Of-Service Attack and How Can It Impact Cybersecurity?
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A denial-of-service attack (DoS) is a type of cyberattack that causes networked systems to slow down, become unavailable, or even crash. Depending on its type and severity, DoS can have significant effects on an organization’s business operations.
DDoS attacks are on the rise and becoming more complex. They affect a wider range of services, such as mobile devices and critical infrastructure systems.
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What is a Denial-of-Service Attack? How Does it Impact Cybersecurity?
A denial-of-service attack (DoS) in cybersecurity is a type of cyberattack that aims to block legitimate users from accessing their expected services and resources. Doing this involves flooding the targeted host or network with traffic until it cannot respond or crashes.
DoS attacks can last anywhere from a few hours to months and cost companies time and money while their resources and services are unavailable. They could be caused by malicious activities such as exploiting security flaws in network packets, software, programming, or logical systems, among others.
DDoS attacks are much larger in scope and require thousands (or even millions) of connected devices to achieve their objective, making them much harder to counter than DoS attacks that only use one internet connection. They may target a range of services, such as emergency management services, healthcare services, financial systems, and critical infrastructure components.
Overload-based DoS attacks send a large volume of network packets, using protocols like UDP or Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP). The attacker sends these requests with an arbitrary source address, causing the victim’s computer to check for applications listening at each port and then reply with an ICMP “Destination Unreachable” packet when it can’t process them.
This technique can be highly effective, as it overloads the targeted server’s bandwidth and causes it to crash. It is one of the most prevalent types of DDoS attacks and may be employed to overload servers running applications such as DNS.
Volume-based DoS attacks utilize all available bandwidth between a target and the wider internet, often through DNS amplification or man-in-the-middle (MitM) attacks.
Unintentional DoS occurs when a popular website posts a link to a less well-prepared site, drawing in large numbers of users who click the link. The popularity of that link can quickly create a domino effect and take down the primary site as well.
DDoS attacks are on the rise as businesses and consumers increasingly rely on digital platforms for communication and transactions. They’re becoming more sophisticated and damaging, potentially leading to losses of business, customer trust, and brand reputation.
What Types of Denial-of-Service Attacks Exist in Cybersecurity?
Denial-of-service attacks (DOMAs) are cyber incidents that disrupt an individual or organization’s ability to function. These may be intentional or accidental, but they are an increasingly prevalent threat in cybersecurity.
Attackers frequently attempt to deny access to a website or resource they want taken down. This can be accomplished through manipulating network packets, programming vulnerabilities, logical errors in resource handling procedures, and more.
Denial-of-service attacks (DDoS) are the most prevalent in cybersecurity, and they involve flooding a targeted system or network with traffic that overwhelms its resources and makes it unavailable to other users. While flood attacks can be mitigated by restarting the target server, they become much harder to recover from when multiple sources launch an organized distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack.
Other types of denial-of-service attacks aim to extort money from an organization by shutting down operations or taking advantage of customers. They could also be carried out as forms of blackmail or terrorism.
Some of these attacks can be devastating. For instance, the Stuxnet cyber-attack in 2012 targeted industrial control systems, causing them to malfunction.
Aside from the financial costs, an attack can be highly disruptive and cause business disruptions as well as reputation damage. These types of attacks are often perpetrated by ‘hacktivists’ who wish to target websites they disagree with ideologically or demonstrate their skillset.
The two most prevalent DDoS attacks are ICMP floods and SYN floods. Both rely on the network’s ability to handle ICMP messages, known as pings, which enable computers to exchange data when they connect with one another.
These attacks can be prevented by setting up firewalls that filter incoming traffic. These filters may be applied at both the infrastructure and application-layer levels.
A firewall is a security appliance that sits between an internet connection and a server, shielding it from external attacks. These devices can be effective in safeguarding a company’s IT environment from DDoS attacks.
Another type of DDoS attack is called “reversal” or “flooding.” This malicious practice involves flooding a system with ICMP ping packets to overwhelm it and cause it to crash. This can happen when running outdated software on an outdated computer or connecting to an inadequate Internet service provider (ISP).
What Motivates Attackers to Carry Out Denial-of-Service Attacks?
Denial-of-service attacks (DoS attacks), whether perpetrated by hackers or criminals, are a frequent and expensive security occurrence. DoS attacks cause disruptions to various services like email, online banking, and websites by sending too many requests to an infrastructure or network resource.
Attackers typically flood a targeted server or service with an excessive amount of traffic until it fails to respond or crashes. These attacks can last hours, days, or weeks and cost companies money and resources while their resources remain unavailable for use.
Attackers may be motivated by revenge, blackmail, or hacktivism. They are frequently targeting companies that lack the capacity to safeguard their systems against cyberattacks.
In addition to being disruptive, DoS attacks can damage a business’s reputation. They make it difficult for customers to use a service, disrupt or prevent operations, and even force companies to pay ransom in order to retrieve lost assets.
DoS attacks can be carried out by either an individual attacker or a botnet – which is comprised of compromised machines controlled by malware. They send spam and fake requests to target servers or computers, causing them to crash.
The number of DoS attacks is on the rise, becoming more sophisticated as hackers gain access to more systems. In 2019, there were 9.5 million DoS attacks, and this number is forecast to reach 15.4 million by 2023.
With more businesses, organizations, and governments turning to the internet for critical operations, cyberattacks have become an increasingly serious risk. Therefore, security professionals need to be familiar with different types of attacks and how they can be avoided.
Establishing an organized review, planning, and monitoring process is essential for mitigating denial-of-service attacks on your organization. It can also assist you in finding and implementing the most efficient mitigation tactics.
How Can We Detect a Denial-of-Service Attack?
Denial-of-service attacks (DOMAs) in cybersecurity refer to malicious cyberattacks that prevent legitimate users from accessing network resources. DOMs typically involve flooding a computer or network with traffic and are usually the result of malware.
Different types of DoS attacks exist, and detecting them can be challenging. Depending on the type, it may be necessary to take various mitigation measures and procedures in order to protect an organization from major financial harm caused by a DoS attack.
Application-layer DoS attacks use exploits and malicious code to flood system resources such as memory and CPU time with fake traffic. They may cause applications to crash or fill up the victim’s disk space with logs. Some application-layer DoS attacks target specific protocols or servers, like DNS servers and Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) servers.
These attacks can be more subtle than volumetric DoS attacks, which use all available bandwidth to disrupt systems. They typically employ UDP or Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) for sending large amounts of datagrams, taking up all available space so legitimate traffic cannot process.
A SYN flood is a commonly used protocol attack in which an attacker sends a connection request to the targeted server but never completes their handshake. This keeps the port occupied with malicious requests until it becomes saturated with connections that cannot be responded to by legitimate users.
ICMP flooding occurs when misconfigured network devices send spoofed packets that ping every device on the target’s network, creating more traffic than would be generated if one machine were sending out normal traffic. These attacks, also referred to as smurf attacks or the “ping of death,” have the potential to overwhelm a network without being detected by traditional security tools.
DDoS detection, however, is an integral component of an effective response to these attacks. This detection technique is necessary because it enables organizations to distinguish legitimate traffic from malicious activity.
DDoS detection can help mitigate the effects of these attacks by stopping spoofed traffic and broadcasting/echo services that spread the attack to more devices. It also alerts users when attacks originate from their networks, giving them time to respond promptly when an attack is identified.
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