DDoS: Definition, Identification & Prevention

In today’s digital era, internet connectivity is an essential part of business and communication. Along with this, many cyberattacks around us are also increasingly complex and diverse. One type of malicious cyberattack is DDoS, which can disrupt online services in your company. Looking further at the impact of the attack, DDoS is one of the cyber attacks that cannot be ignored. To learn more about DDoS, let’s see the following explanation to understand the definition of DDoS, how to identify DDoS attacks and tips to prevent DDoS attacks.

Definition of DDoS

According to Cloudflare, DDoS known as a distributed denial-of-service attack is a targeted malicious attempt to spam a server or infrastructure to disrupt traffic from a server, service, or network. These attacks focus on making a service or website unavailable to visitors by destroying server capacity through a flood of high traffic.

How to Identify DDoS Attacks

An obvious symptom of a DDoS attack is when the site or service you provide suddenly becomes slow and unavailable. This unavailable service could be due to an unnatural surge in traffic due to DDoS, but further investigation must be needed to be able to ascertain the cause of this problem. Here are some ways to recognize DDoS attacks that you need to know:

1. The presence of a suspicious amount of traffic from a single IP address or IP range.

2. High CPU loads.

3. Excessive bandwidth usage.

4. The flood of traffic from users with the same behavior profile as device, location, or web browser version.

5. The surge in requests that can’t be routed to a single page.

6. Traffic patterns that appear odd such as during certain hours of the day or patterns that appear unnatural (e.g. surges every 10-15 minutes).

How to Prevent DDoS Attacks

To keep your company’s web and server performance optimized, it is necessary to take precautions against DDoS attacks. This prevention also protects your business so that it continues to run smoothly without any obstacles to users. Here are some ways you can implement to prevent server attacks from DDoS as quoted from Embroker:

1. Prepare a DDoS Response Plan

When your company suffers from a DDoS attack, you must prepare a quick response to prevent damage and stabilize your system. A well-designed DDoS response plan will guide your team and allow them to act quickly in case of an emergency. Things that should be planned in preparation for a good response are identifying the team that will be responsible and making sure to identify the source of the DDoS attack.

2. System Protection and Network Security Infrastructure

Attackers of your company’s system usually look for loopholes in the security system when they want to carry out DDoS attacks. Therefore, it is very important to improve system protection and network security infrastructure. Firewall protection and anti-virus software are recommended as the primary defense. However, consider using more layers of security, such as anti-spam content filtering, endpoint security, or web security tools to ensure security from multiple sources of harm.

3. Use Network Monitoring

A sudden surge in traffic on a network in your server is one of the signs of a DDoS attack. Therefore, it is important to monitor network traffic so that everything remains under control and runs normally. Prevention by using a network monitoring application can be a solution to avoid DDoS attacks that can cause your server to go down. If you need a recommendation for an application that includes network, server, and web/API monitoring, we can recommend our product, Netmonk Prime, which has premium features such as real-time monitoring, real-time notification, and regular reports in PDF format.

4. Implement a CDN 

CDN (Content Delivery Network) also helps prevent DDoS attacks through the port protocol implemented by CDN to filter out abnormal requests on your website. CDN will work by spreading traffic across servers in different locations, so hackers will find it difficult to find your original server. In the end, the traffic on your website will be more balanced by using a CDN, so your server doesn’t get out of control.

5. Conduct the Best Assessment

Regular security assessments are essential to be able to spot security flaws that might allow an attacker to launch a DDoS attack. Assessments every three months or six months can allow you and your team to fix security gaps before a DDoS attacker capitalizes on a security hole in the server.

In conclusion, DDoS is a cyberattack that cannot be ignored. The effects of DDoS can affect the performance of your server and business so that it cannot work optimally. With a good understanding of DDoS and how to prevent it, it can be easier for you to avoid DDoS attacks. By implementing the right precautions, you can ensure to provide the best service to your users.

References:

https://www.cloudflare.com/learning/ddos/what-is-a-ddos-attack/

https://www.embroker.com/blog/how-to-prevent-ddos-attacks/