Have you ever attempted to purchase tickets for a large event only to discover that the seller’s website had collapsed under the weight of thousands of people all attempting to do the same thing at the same time? The ticket site goes down – usually temporarily – because the server is overloaded with traffic it cannot handle. The same principle is used in criminal Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.
A DDoS attack floods a business with internet traffic in an attempt to overwhelm the system and force it to fail.
As a result, the company and its customers are unable to access services. This could result in a temporary failure or something more serious. The average DDoS attack lasted 50 minutes last year.
That may not seem like a long time, but it is enough to irritate customers or bring business to a halt. And downtime can be expensive.
The really bad news is that DDoS attacks are not only becoming larger, more sophisticated, and more common, but they are also becoming more common.
The largest DDoS attack ever reported was reportedly blocked recently. It sent 71 million requests per SECOND to its target’s servers at its peak. Previously, the highest reported incident was 46 million requests per second.
Worse, more businesses are reporting DDoS attacks, with criminals demanding large ransoms to stop the attack.
What does this have to do with you?
It is critical to ensure that all of your security measures are up to date and functioning properly. Are your firewalls up to the task, and do you have DDoS monitoring and prevention tools in place? Is your team fully aware of the significance of remaining vigilant?
We can help make sure your business stays protected. Just get in touch.