In the first post on DDoS, I considered some mechanisms to disperse an attack across multiple edges (I actually plan to return to this topic with further thoughts in a future post). The second post considered some of the ways you can scrub DDoS traffic. This post is going to complete the basic lineup of reacting to DDoS attacks by considering how to block an attack before it hits your network -- upstream. more
Black Frog -- a new effort to continue the SO-CALLED Blue Security fight against spammers. A botnet, a crime, a stupid idea that I wish would have worked -- News items on Black Frog. Blue Frog by Blue Security was a good effort. Why? Because they wanted to "get spammers back". They withstood tremendous DDoS attacks and abuse reports, getting kicked from ISP after ISP. ...The road to hell is filled with good intentions. Theirs was golden, but they got to hell, quite literally, non-the-less. ...When Blue Security went down, some of us made a bet as to when two bored guys sitting and planning their millions in some café would show up, with Blue Security's business plan minus the DDoS factor. Well -- they just did. more
DDoS attacks, phishing scams and malware. We battle these dark forces every day - and every day they get more sophisticated. But what worries me isn't just keeping up with them, it is keeping up with the sheer volume of devices and data that these forces can enlist in an attack. That's why we as an industry need to come together and share best practices - at the ICANN community, at the IETF and elsewhere - so collectively we are ready for the future. more
This very interesting document was released by ICANN's Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) for public comment yesterday. And it asks some fundamental questions while at the same time pointing to sources such as the Honeynet Alliance's reports on fast flux. more
For the first time, a large-scale analysis of victims of internet denial-of-service (DoS) attacks worldwide has resulted in discovery of millions of network addresses subjeted to denial-of-service attacks over a two-year period. more
In Tony Li's article on path MTU discovery we see this text: "The next attempt to solve the MTU problem has been Packetization Layer Path MTU Discovery (PLPMTUD). Rather than depending on ICMP messaging, in this approach, the transport layer depends on packet loss to determine that the packet was too big for the network. Heuristics are used to differentiate between MTU problems and congestion. Obviously, this technique is only practical for protocols where the source can determine that there has been packet loss. Unidirectional, unacknowledged transfers, typically using UDP, would not be able to use this mechanism. To date, PLPMTUD hasn't demonstrated a significant improvement in the situation." Tony's article is (as usual) quite readable and useful, but my specific concern here is DNS... more
Conventional thinking or solutions will no longer work in the new era of ISIS and the 'Unprecedented' cyber and non-cyber attacks we live in today. Like it or not, everyone is impacted, and no one is immune. Whether you are an average citizen, a chairman or CEO of a multinational, or a government or academic institution leader, the questions to ponder are: Do you know what to do next? Do you know what the solution is? more
The year 2016 will go down in infamy for a number of reasons. It was the year an armed militia occupied an Oregon wildlife refuge, Britain voted to Brexit, an overarching event that will simply be referred to as The Election occurred, and Justin Bieber made reluctant beliebers out of all of us. 2016 was also the worst year on record for distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks by a margin that can only be considered massive. more
The Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) has announced the launch of a security service called D-Zone DNS Firewall -- a cloud-based cybersecurity solution -- to protect Canadian organizations from rasomware and malware. more
The Domain Name System, or DNS, has come a long way since its early days and the constant expansion of consumer activity and security concerns has raised further awareness about the critical role of the DNS. However, as the Yankee Group Research points out in a recent report, "there are more changes coming that are also raising the profile of DNS -- notably the move to cloud computing and the migration to IPv6." Suffice to say this is "Not Your Father's DNS". The report titled, "DNS: Risk, Reward and Managed Services" takes a fresh look at today's state of the DNS and the pros and cons of in-house, ISP and managed service provider DNS management options. more
Three vectors were exploited in the recent DDoS attack against Spamhaus: 1) Amplification of DNS queries through the use of DNSSEC signed data; 2) Spoofed source addresses due to lack of ingress filtering (BCP-38) on originating networks; 3) Utilisation of multiple open DNS resolvers While. 1) is unavoidable simply due to the additional data that DNSSEC produces, and 2) "should" be practised as part of any provider's network configuration, it is 3) that requires "you and I" ensure that systems are adequately configured. more
As the weeks remaining in 2011 dwindle and 2012 peaks out from behind the last page of the calendar, it must once again be that time of year for purposeful reflection and prediction. Or is that navel gazing and star gazing? At the highest level of navel gazing you could probably sum up 2011 with one word -- "More"... But let's put that aside for now. What does 2012 hold in stall for us? more
There has been a recent spate of well publicised Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks that bring websites down and render them useless, including Evernote and most recently Feedly. In light of this, here are some comments and tips to help companies evaluate and prepare not to be held for ransom or suffer lost reputation and sales as a result. more
The following is a selected summary of the recent NANOG 63 meeting, held in early February, with some personal views and opinions thrown in! ...One view of the IETF's positioning is that as a technology standardisation venue, the immediate circle of engagement in IETF activities is the producers of equipment and applications, and the common objective is interoperability. more
'It could've been worse' is a fascinating expression. It implies that the incident in question obviously could have been worse than expected, however it also implies that it could have been better, ultimately leading to the conclusion that it was at least somewhat bad. So both fortunately and unfortunately for three Greek banks, the ransom DDoS attacks levied against them by hacker group the Armada Collective could have been worse. more
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