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Experts Say Internet 'Mega' Attacks Are on the Rise (fortune.com)

Posted by msmash on from the security-woes dept.

An anonymous reader shares a Fortune report:The phenomenon of hackers knocking websites offline with massive floods of Internet traffic is nothing new. But the pattern of these so-called DDoS attacks (for "distributed denial of service") is changing, according to a new report from internet provider Akamai. The report, published on Tuesday, suggests the overall number of DDoS attacks has not risen significantly in 2016, but that the force of these attacks is increasing. Akamai says it confronted 19 "mega attacks" in the third quarter of this year, including the two biggest it has ever encountered in history. "It's interesting that while the overall number of attacks fell by 8% quarter over quarter, the number of large attacks, as well as the size of the biggest attacks, grew significantly," said the report.

44 comments

  1. It would be nice... by cayenne8 · · Score: 3, Funny
    ...if they'd target a couple of the most disruptive sites out there...Facebook and Twitter.

    I'd just love to see the panic on peoples' faces, especially the most recent generation which doesn't seem to know how to carry on a real live, meatspace interaction without it.....

    Hell, turn them off for maybe a couple of weeks and give everyone a break.

    It would be amazing to see what actually gets done during that outtage......

    --
    Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    1. Re:It would be nice... by FatdogHaiku · · Score: 1

      But how would people get their fake news and echo chamber positive feedback?
      Are you working for the newsprint industry?

      --
      You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
    2. Re:It would be nice... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "The most recent generation" doesn't use Facebook. You're not even telling the right people to get off your lawn.

      Also, you should learn what ellipses are actually for and start using them sensibly.

    3. Re:It would be nice... by freeze128 · · Score: 1

      Could have been useful during the election. It's too late now.

    4. Re:It would be nice... by diesalesmandie · · Score: 1

      ...if they'd target a couple of the most disruptive sites out there...Facebook and Twitter.

      I'd just love to see the panic on peoples' faces, especially the most recent generation which doesn't seem to know how to carry on a real live, meatspace interaction without it.....

      Hell, turn them off for maybe a couple of weeks and give everyone a break.

      It would be amazing to see what actually gets done during that outtage......

      Project much?

      --
      This is my sig, there are many like it but this one is mine
    5. Re:It would be nice... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The most recent generation is as fragile as snowflakes. Take away their social media, and they'll self-destruct.

    6. Re:It would be nice... by Drethon · · Score: 1

      The most recent generation is as fragile as snowflakes. Take away their social media, and they'll self-destruct.

      But everyone tells me I'm a unique and beautiful snowflake!

    7. Re:It would be nice... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How big of a DDOS would it take to bring Google, Facebook, or Twitter down? They have the infrastructure to handle traffic from essentially the whole world. Could they swallow one of these huge DDOS attacks?

    8. Re:It would be nice... by cayenne8 · · Score: 1

      But everyone tells me I'm a unique and beautiful snowflake!

      And, here's your participation trophy...

      ;)

      --
      Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    9. Re:It would be nice... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Heh, owned.

  2. 3 woirds: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Class
    Action
    Lawsuit

    Captcha: belched

    1. Re:3 woirds: by Archangel+Michael · · Score: 1

      against??

      The ONLY way to stop a DDOS, is to isolate, and knock off endpoints that are compromised and under the command and control of the perpetrators.

      And the only way to do that, is to start having a Distributed response. It isn't going to be easy but it is the only way.

      --
      Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
    2. Re:3 woirds: by pr0fessor · · Score: 1

      Are you saying vigilante worms that look for known infections and infection paths then remove and patch them.

      Wasn't there already a few that did that?
       

  3. Captain Obvious agrees by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Internet 'Mega' attacks, are indeed, on the rise.

  4. Experts take it into a butt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Internets say mega experts are on the rise

  5. Old man yells at cloud by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I tells ya once people start communicating online it will surely lead to dancing, hand holding, memes and other sinful activities

    1. Re:Old man yells at cloud by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

      He is so old he thinks that the most recent generation still uses Twitter and Facebook. Everyone knows they use Snapchat and Instagram.

    2. Re:Old man yells at cloud by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      He's pining for the days when he could strangle those entitled brats with his string and cans.

    3. Re:Old man yells at cloud by fisted · · Score: 2

      He is old enough to know that "facebook and twitter" are mere placeholders for $latest_trendy_social_platform. Like it mattered in the slightest which particular platform that actually is. Now get off our lawn, PFY.

      --
      CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
    4. Re:Old man yells at cloud by 110010001000 · · Score: 2

      There is a big difference between Facegram and Twitterchat, old man!

    5. Re:Old man yells at cloud by tlhIngan · · Score: 1

      He is so old he thinks that the most recent generation still uses Twitter and Facebook. Everyone knows they use Snapchat and Instagram.

      Instagram is owned by Facebook. Snapchat looks like it's not owned by Facebook or Twitter, yet, but who knows in a week's time.

      So in the end, they all use Twitter and Facebook, or whatever trendy social network service is owned by them.

    6. Re:Old man yells at cloud by ogdenk · · Score: 1

      Damn kids today with their Slapchat, Chitter, Instaflam and BookFace.... brats don't know how good they got it. Back in my day we posted on BBS's using an ASR-33 teletype and a 110bps acoustic coupler modem hooked to our homebuilt S100 CP/M crate.... and we LIKED IT. Get offa muh LAWN!!!

      (Disclaimer: In reality I started out with an Atari 130XE and a 1200bps smartmodem..... I'm not THAT old.)

  6. Coincidence? by alvinrod · · Score: 1

    I wonder if they have any relation to the recent "super" moons that we've been hearing about recently.

    1. Re:Coincidence? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Since blowing up the Moon is the only action that will help us fight DDoS Mega-attacks from the IoBT botnet, then by god we must blow up the Moon. I hope our next administration will have the resolve to act decisively on this urgent matter.

    2. Re:Coincidence? by jbmartin6 · · Score: 1

      Mr Show did it

      --
      This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
  7. IORT or IOCT by Tablizer · · Score: 1

    Internet of Rogue Things, or Internet of Compromised Things

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
    1. Re:IORT or IOCT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      IoBT: Internet of Broken Things

  8. Accidental superweapons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The reason "mega" attacks are on the rise is mostly that people now have very easy access to an extremely large botnet to use in these attacks, thanks to "Internet of Things" device manufacturers not giving a shit about the security of their devices. These attacks aren't coming from sophisticated, high tech cyberweapons or anything; it's mostly some guys on 4chan who can send some commands to Mirai. There needs to be a body of some kind who can force these manufacturers to write some decent code for their devices, or the people on the ground need to give them a financial incentive to do so.

    1. Re:Accidental superweapons by Moheeheeko · · Score: 1

      Exactly, the people who use these botnets aren't increasing in number, the number of stupid people on the internet getting infected are.

    2. Re:Accidental superweapons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I do not blame the average Joe user who plugs in an off-the-shelf device with gaping security holes. The blame likes pretty much 100% with the vendor of such devices.

    3. Re:Accidental superweapons by Archangel+Michael · · Score: 1

      And good luck finding that fly by night device maker that sold cheap IOT($Device) . They are already out of business.

      Now what? How do you get those out of use?

      --
      Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
    4. Re:Accidental superweapons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Exactly, the people who use these botnets aren't increasing in number, the number of stupid people on the internet getting infected are."

      I'll repeat this again and again until it bores deep into you self-entitled shitheads:
      Even an advanced Consumer has neither the knowledge nor the Tools to go down to BestBuy to check if the latest IoT is capable of being infected, and if it is, what to do about. You don't either, because if you did, you would be peppering the Forums with Manufacturers, Model Numbers, Serial Number ranges, Code versions, and OEM Suppliers, as well as issues and mitigations. No, instead you blame the End Users, and the only stupid thing that they did was trust sneering "Expert" people like _You_. That Trust is ending.
      These are failures of the entire lazy ignorant IT Industry, who refuses to accept their responsibilities or even acknowledge them.
      There needs to be far fewer "average" Programmers and Engineers, and the ones remaining need to be far better because, and I've seen it before, what happens is otherwise the few Best spend all their time cleaning up the messes that the many Gits left behind. (This was a big problem in the US Automotive Industry four decades back; and many Americans simply stopped buying American Cars. They bought Toyotas that were competent and efficient in performance, that got good mileage, and that didn't constantly break down.)

    5. Re:Accidental superweapons by 0100010001010011 · · Score: 1

      The botnets are effective because people forgot how the internet was designed. Lets consolidate all of our services to a few providers in a limited numeber of locations, what could go wrong? /s

      The Internet itself was designed to withstand a nuclear attack on any part of it. From what I've read FatBoy leaves a bit more destruction in its path than a bunch of DNS lookups or ping -f.

      Stop consolidating all of your core into a few data centers.

      And if you're really pissed that the internet is 'broken' go back to making your own hosts file.

    6. Re:Accidental superweapons by ebyrob · · Score: 1

      Have their ISP shut down the IP connecting them to the internet. Once the infected broken device is removed, their NATed sub-network can have internet again.

  9. obviously connected by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This is obvious connected to that global warming stuff what's bin going 'round.

  10. Best weapon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Shipping devices with piss-poor security by default needs to be made illegal with stiff penalties. That would honestly make a massive dent in the ability to create botnets.

  11. MAGA - LOL, misread the fuckin title by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    that's fuckin cool

    BTW: /r/trees and /r/eldertrees

  12. Who'da thunk it? by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 1

    Who could have possibly predicted that the Internet of Things was a security nightmare? Oh that's right, everyone with half a brain.

    --
    Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
    1. Re:Who'da thunk it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Even those of us with a full brain.

      Yuk, yuk, yuk, yuk, yuk.

  13. Cyber 9/11 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The elites are preparing for a cyber 9/11. Whether they perpetrate it or let it happen knowingly, this article is a signal.

  14. Slashdot! by antdude · · Score: 1

    What about /.? What will we do? ;)

    --
    Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
  15. The sell and weakening of AdBlock plus.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The selling of AdBlock plus to a third party and the subsequent weakening of the product has caused an order of magnitude increase in computer infections and rising. Homeland security should use eminent domain and take it and restore it to full functionality, then they should start a full on war on ads.

  16. AdBlock = inferior + 'souled-out' vs. hosts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Adblock can't do (or do as well) 16 things hosts do 4 speed, security & reliability:

    1.) Protect vs. bad sites (past ads)
    2.) Protect vs. fastflux botnet C&C servers
    3.) Protect vs. dynamic dns botnet C&C servers
    4.) Protect vs. DGA botnet C&C servers
    5.) Protect vs. downed DNS (reliability)
    6.) Protect vs. DNS redirect poisoned/downed dns
    7.) Protect vs. trackers
    8.) Protect vs. spam payloads
    9.) Protect vs. phish payloads
    10.) Protect vs. caps
    11.) Get past dns blocks
    12.) Keep off dns request logs
    13.) Speed up 2 ways (adblocks & hardcodes)
    14.) Work on anything webbound multiplatform.
    15.) Ez data edit
    16.) Block ads more efficiently in cpu/ram/I-O use

    APK

    P.S.=> Ab+ does less vs. hosts less efficiently (a 128-151mb memory hog http://cdn.ghacks.net/wp-conte...)

    ClarityRay defeats it

    Ab+'s bribed not to work by default http://www.businessinsider.com...

    AdBlock's SLOWER: http://superuser.com/questions...

  17. Best custom hosts file creator bar none by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    APK Hosts File Engine 9.0++ SR-4 32/64-bit https://www.google.com/search?...

    Ads rob speed, security (malvertising) & privacy (tracking).

    Hosts add speed (hardcodes/adblocks), security (bad sites/poisoned dns), reliability (dns down), & anonymity (dns requestlogs/trackers) natively.

    Works vs. caps & PUSH ads.

    Avg. page = big as Doom http://www.theregister.co.uk/2... & ads = 40% of it.

    Hosts != ClarityRay blockable (vs. souled-out to admen inferior wasteful redundant slow usermode addons)

    Less power/cpu/ram + IO use vs. DNS/routers/addons/antivirus (slows you) + less security issues/complexity.

    Compliments firewalls (blocking less used IP addys vs. hosts blocking more used domains) & DNS (lightens dns load).

    Gets data via 10 security sites.

    APK

    P.S. - Safe https://www.virustotal.com/en/... (Verified by Malwarebytes' S. Burn "seen the code & it's safe" http://forum.hosts-file.net/vi... )