An unprecedented concentration of DDoS attacks on US networks was observed, with more than 1,000 victims identified in various states. Whether motivated by politics, profiteering, crime or other malicious purposes, attacks were frequent and impactful. What’s more, with the COVID-19 pandemic elevating the importance of essential network services such as banking, online shopping, and virtual meetings, the impact of DDoS attacks is bound to become only more severe.
- DNS Amplification was the most common type of attack throughout 2019. In Q4 alone, DNS was the most frequently exploited vector, with amplification attacks soaring nearly 3,000% YOY.
- ASN-level networks in the US, UK, and China were hit the hardest, with the US being hit by more than 42M attacks. Reflection attacks that exploit open DNS resolvers were the most frequent, while stealthy “Bit-and-Piece” attacks remained a threat and continued to cause outages.
- A growing pool of insecure IoT devices suggests that IoT botnets will continue to thrive. At the same time, protecting public and open recursive DNS resolvers from abuses that amplify attack traffic is becoming an impossible mission, while easy access to DDoS-for-hire services allows relative novices to launch massive attacks very cost effectively.
