Tag Archives: var-username

Despite increased spend, why doesn’t DDoS mitigation always work?

Newly published research suggests that while there has been a marked increase in spending to mitigate against Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, organisations are still falling victim. Newly published research suggests that while there has been a marked increase in spending to mitigate against Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, organisations are still falling victim. The ‘DDoS 2017 Report: Dangerous Overconfidence’, published today by CDNetworks, reveals that spending on DDoS mitigation in the UK has increased over the last year. Indeed, it says that the average annual spend is now £24,200 and 20 percent of businesses are investing more than £40,000 per year. While 83 percent of businesses were confident of their resilience against the business continuity threat, despite the greater investment more than half (54 percent) still ended up victims of a successful DDoS attack during the last 12 months that took their website, network or online app down. According to Kaspersky Lab’s Global IT Security Risks Survey 2017, some 33 percent of organisations have experienced an attack this year, twice the number in 2016. While 20 percent were small businesses, 41 percent were enterprises. Then there’s the Neustar Global DDoS Attacks and Cyber Security Insights report which revealed 92 percent of those attacked reported theft of intellectual property, customer data or financial assets; and 36 percent saw malware activation happening during the DDoS attack. Research by the Imperva Incapsula security team suggests that attack patterns are changing, with high packet rate attacks becoming the norm. An A10 Networks report confirms this to be the case, suggesting that attacks greater than 50Gbps have quadrupled over the past two years and companies experiencing between 6-25 attacks per year also quadrupling in that timeframe. Given the growing threat, and you only have to look at some of the recent victims such as The National Lottery and Blizzard Entertainment for example, to realise that DDoS mitigation isn’t always working. SC Media UK put the ‘why does DDoS mitigation fail’ question to several vendors providing this type of service. But first, we spoke to Alex Nam, managing director of CDNetworks (US & EMEA) who told us there are various reasons including that some forms of DDoS mitigation don’t protect against all forms of attack. “A layer 7 DDoS attack, which impacts applications and the end-user,” Nam explained, “can only be protected against using web application firewall technology for example.” So not understanding the different types of attack, or the types of technology that can be protected, is a reason why DDoS mitigation often fails according to Nam. Rich Groves, the A10 director of research and development, thinks that the question would be better phrased as ‘what causes DDoS solutions to fail in certain instances?’ as he insists “otherwise it implies DDoS solutions are failing across the board, which isn’t the case.” Kirill Kasavchenko, principal security technologist (EMEA) at Arbor Network, also thinks that there is an important distinction to be made between whether DDoS mitigation fails or the approach to it does. “As the headlines became more dramatic, more vendors have rushed to claim they have a solution for the DDoS problem,” Kasavchenko explains, “this has caused much confusion in the market.” So, for example, elements of a layered security strategy such as IPS devices and firewalls address network integrity and confidentiality but not availability. They are stateful, inline, solutions that not only “are vulnerable to DDoS attacks” but “often become the targets themselves.” Indeed, Arbor’s annual security report shows 40 percent of respondents seeing firewalls fail as a direct result of a DDoS attack. Meanwhile, Ben Herzberg, security research group manager at Imperva, told SC Media that attackers are “changing tactics rapidly specifically to defeat anti-DDoS solutions, such as hit-and-run and pulse wave attacks” which should come as no great surprise to anyone. James Willett, SVP of products at Neustar, explained that attackers “routinely scout and reconnoitre their targets launching throttled attacks to identify defence response, defence tactics, and defence capacity.” Once known, the proper types and sizes of attacks can be readily crafted to overwhelm unsuspecting organisations that lack effective cloud-based mitigation depth. So what should enterprises be doing to ensure that spending on DDoS mitigation is invested wisely? “If they haven’t already, they should consider a cloud-based DDoS mitigation service that automatically routes traffic through the service and only delivers clean traffic,” Ben Herzberg insists, adding “these services are supported by dedicated security staff that track attack patterns on a daily basis and can quickly react to changing attack patterns.” James Willett suggests they need to understand that not all clouds are managed the same. “Organisations can ensure proper investments that reduce impact and minimise disruption risk,” he told SC, “by pressing security providers on their management of good and bad traffic.” Rich Groves agrees that the focus “should be on vendor performance and solution effectiveness rather than on any particular feature set.” The highest-performing DDoS detection and mitigation available to them at the best price range to identify attack traffic and eliminate it, in other words. But perhaps Kasavchenko has the most straightforward advice of all: “The number one thing to do is work with a DDoS mitigation vendor. Vendors who treat DDoS as an add-on are likely to have very limited capabilities…” Source: https://www.scmagazineuk.com/despite-increased-spend-why-doesnt-ddos-mitigation-always-work/article/699729/

DDoS Attacks Cause Train Delays Across Sweden

DDoS attacks on two separate days have brought down several IT systems employed by Sweden’s transport agencies, causing train delays in some cases. The incidents took place early in the mornings of Wednesday and Thursday, October 11 and 12, this week. The first attack hit the Sweden Transport Administration (Trafikverket) on Wednesday. According to local press, the attack brought down the IT system that manages train orders. The agency had to stop or delay trains for the time of the attack. Trafikverket’s email system and website also went down, exacerbating the issue and preventing travelers from making reservations or getting updates on the delays. The agency used Facebook to manage the crisis and keep travelers informed. Road traffic maps were also affected, an issue that lingers even today, at the time of publishing, according to the agency’s website. Three Swedish transportation agencies targeted Speaking to local media, Trafikverket officials said the attack was cleverly aimed at TDC and DGC, the agency’s two service providers, but they were both aimed in such a way to affect the agency’s services. Trafikverket was able to restore service in a few hours, but the delays affected the entire day’s train operations. While initially, some might have thought this was a random incident, the next day, a similar DDoS attack hit the website of another government agency, the Sweden Transport Agency (Transportstyrelsen), and public transport operator Västtrafik, who provides train, bus, ferry, and tram transport for parts of Western Sweden. Cyber-warfare implications In perspective, both incidents give the impression of someone probing various parts of Sweden’s transportation system to see how the country would react in the face of a cyber-attack and downtime. The DDoS attacks come a week after a report that Russia was testing cyber-weapons in the Baltic Sea region. In April 2016, Swedish officials blamed Russia for carrying out cyber-attacks on the country’s air traffic control infrastructure that grounded flights for a day in November 2015. Source: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/ddos-attacks-cause-train-delays-across-sweden/

Nginx with Stream Module Dynamic Upstream CNAME

In the age on scalable web applications , many organizations turn to cloud-based server hosting to dynamically add additional servers during peak usage, or attain redundancy by having multiple geographic web -server locations. One of the methods used for this is DNS CNAME resolution. Using this option with various cloud hosting providers that support it can allow the following: 1) Load Balancing. The CNAME DNS record can be configured to respond to requests with more then one IP Address, allowing load balancing of multiple origin servers, dynamically scaled by the cloud hosting providers DNS service. 2) Global Server Load Balancing. The cloud hosting DNS can provide different record results in different geographic areas of the world. This can be achieved based on Geo-Location or other methods. 3) Fail-over redundancy. Since the CNAME record is controlled by the cloud provider, upon failure of one data center, all records pointing to a geographic location which has failed can be automatically switched to the remaining data-center. Is there a way Nginx can perform Dynamic DNS resolution, for CNAME or other records used as Upstreams/Origins? Reverse proxies have been a core component of our service since 2007, to say we are experienced in this area is an understatement. Which is why when a customer of ours was having trouble configuring their open-source Nginx to use cnames for their load balancing configuration, they came to us to see if we had any advice or ideas (one of the many benefits being part of a fully managed DDoS mitigation service). The challenge the customer was facing, and which some of you Nginx administrators may be aware of, is that the open-source version of Nginx does not have a built in dynamic DNS resolver. Essentially it will only resolve domains initially on web-server “start”, and “reload”, but will not update the record if a DNS record changes during running operation. After doing some research on various forums and testing in our labs, we identified that in order to use open-source Nginx to dynamically resolve domains, one would have set the domain in a variable, which would then cause Nginx to resolve the domain in the variable dynamically, and according to Nginx’s DNS Cache/TTL . The variable is then used in the “proxy_pass” directive to send the visitor to the correct origin without requiring a reload to be kept up to date. **There is a problem with using the above workaround for Nginx’s “Stream” module; The “Set” directive does not exist. If you attempt to perform the same method on a TCP Pass-through using Nginx Stream, you will find that since the ‘set $variable “value”; ‘ method is not available within Nginx Stream. The previous method cannot be used. Is there a way to perform dynamic DNS resolution within open-source Nginx’s stream module, or is a 3rd party module that could be used? Although there is a “stream-lua-nginx” module by Openresty team being developed that could be used for such a purpose, we are not aware of any free 3rd party Dynamic DNS resolution modules that work with Stream. There is however a way to use essentially the same method as used with the Nginx HTTP Proxy, by using the Nginx Stream Map directive. Above is the relevant configuration file snippet. **This configuration snippet requires that you have a base nginx.conf configuration already setup. Included in the example are the portions of the configuration that should be present within the Nginx “stream” directive. ***Please keep in mind the following facts: 1) Fail-over / Load Balancing behavior works differently then standard Nginx upstreams. Instead of using Nginx upstream load balancing or Passive health-checks, Load Balancing and Redundancy should be handled by the CNAME DNS service itself; Nginx “Upstream” directives are not used in this case, so there is no way to mark a server as down. Since there is more then one worker process in any deployed configuration, Round Robin DNS , where a Nameserver lookup returns more then one resulting record can be used to perform load balancing. 2) Each Nginx “Worker” will perform DNS lookups for requests handled by that worker. This means that if you have 20 worker processes , all 20 will be performing DNS lookups and caching the results , holding the results in memory for the DNS Cache/TTL configured using the Nginx “resolver” directive. You may want to use a local DNS server or caching resolver in order to lower the number of DNS queries made. Scott Girbav DOSarrest Internet Security Senior Network Security Engineer Source: https://www.dosarrest.com/ddos-blog/nginx-with-stream-module-dynamic-upstream-cname/

See the article here:
Nginx with Stream Module Dynamic Upstream CNAME

33% of businesses hit by DDoS attack in 2017, double that of 2016

Distributed Denial of Service attacks are on the rise this year, and used to gain access to corporate data and harm a victim’s services, according to a Kaspersky Lab report. Cybercriminals are increasingly turning to Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) this year, as 33% of organizations faced such an attack in 2017—up from just 17% in 2016, according to a new report from Kaspersky Lab. These cyber attacks are hitting businesses of all sizes: Of those affected, 20% were very small businesses, 33% were SMBs, and 41% were enterprises. Half of all businesses reported that the frequency and complexity of DDoS attacks targeting organizations like theirs is growing every year, highlighting the need for more awareness and protection against them, according to Kaspersky Lab. Of the companies that were hit in 2016, 82% said that they faced more than one DDoS attack. At this point in 2017, 76% of those hit said they had faced at least one attack. Cybercriminals use DDoS attacks to gain access to valuable corporate data, as well as to cripple a victim’s services, Kaspersky Lab noted. These attacks often result in serious disruption of business: Of the organizations hit by DDoS attacks this year, 26% reported a significant decrease in performance of services, and 14% reported a failure of transactions and processes in affected services. Additionally, some 53% of companies reported that DDoS attacks against them were used as a smokescreen to cover up other types of cybercrime. Half (50%) of these respondents said that the attack hid a malware infection, 49% said that it masked a data leak or theft, 42% said that it was used to cover up a network intrusion or hacking, and 26% said that it was hiding financial theft, Kaspersky Lab found. These results are part of Kaspersky Lab’s annual IT Security Risks survey, which included responses from more than 5,200 representatives of small, medium, and large businesses from 29 countries. “The threat of being hit by a DDoS attack – either standalone or as part of a greater attack arsenal – is showing no signs of diminishing,” said Kirill Ilganaev, head of Kaspersky DDoS protection at Kaspersky Lab, in a press release. “It’s not a case of if an organization will be hit, but when. With the problem growing and affecting every type and size of company, it is important for organizations to protect their IT infrastructure from being infiltrated and keep their data safe from attack.” Want to use this data in your next business presentation? Feel free to copy and paste these top takeaways into your next slideshow. 33% of organizations experienced a DDoS attack in 2017, compared to 17% in 2016. -Kaspersky Lab, 2017 Of organizations hit by DDoS attacks, 20% were very small businesses, 33% were SMBs, and 41% were enterprises. -Kaspersky Lab, 2017 53% of companies reported that DDoS attacks against them were used as a smokescreen to cover up other types of cybercrime, including malware, data leaks, and financial theft. -Kaspersky Lab, 2017 Source: http://www.techrepublic.com/article/33-of-businesses-hit-by-ddos-attack-in-2017-double-that-of-2016/

Read this article:
33% of businesses hit by DDoS attack in 2017, double that of 2016

Euro commissioner calls for more collaboration on cyber security

European commissioner for security union has called for greater awareness of cyber security risks and increased collaboration in defending against them. Cyber threats are one of the top security concerns for nine out of 10 European Union citizens, according to Julian King, European commissioner for security union. “In an internet-connected age that is becoming ever more dependent on internet-connected technologies, we have become more vulnerable to those who are ready to exploit those technologies to try and do us harm for financial or political motives,” he told the CyberSec European Cybersecurity Forum in Krakow, Poland. King, who has previously served as the UK ambassador to France, said that while the digital age brings “huge opportunities”, it also brings risk. But he said these risks are becoming increasingly widely understood, particularly because of events such as the WannaCry and NotPetya attacks in May and June 2017, which affected hundreds of thousands of individuals and organisations in more than 150 countries and naturally serve as a “wake-up call”. According to the latest Europol report on internet organised crime, King said the barriers to committing cyber attacks are “woefully low”, with little chance of getting caught, mainly because of the availability of a “vast range” of cyber criminal tools and services on the dark net, with some attacks costing as little as $5. “For criminals, non-state and state actors, life has never been so easy,” he said, “with an arsenal that includes ransomware, phishing tools, Trojans, distributed denial of service [DDoS] attacks, botnets and identity theft services.” In 2016, said King, European citizens were the subject of two billion data breaches, and every month, one in five industrial computers was attacked. Since 2016, more than 4,000 ransomware attacks have taken place every day across the EU – a 300% increase on 2015, he said. Aviation systems face an average of 1,000 cyber attacks a month, and card-not-present fraud is currently worth about €1bn a year in the Eurozone alone. ‘Tackle this scourge’ “If we were talking about a public health issue, then we would be using the word ‘pandemic’ to describe the scale of the challenge,” said King, “so I think it is time to shift our efforts to tackle this scourge, which is precisely what the European Commission, with the other institutions and the member states, wants to do. “We want to strengthen resilience, build effective deterrents and create durable cyber defence.” King pointed out that this work has been going on for some time, and that the European Union has had a cyber security strategy since 2013. “The Network and Information System [NIS] directive, agreed in 2016, built on that and will require [operators of] essential systems to assess risk, prepare a strategy, put in place protections, develop capabilities and competence, educate staff and the public, and share information about threats and incidents,” he said. The challenge is that the threat itself does not stand still, said King. “It continues to change and evolve, both in its nature and in terms of the expanding attack surface that we are seeking to protect and manage, with homes, hospitals, governments, electricity grids and cars becoming increasingly connected.” ‘Offline’ lives affected Another important fact to acknowledge, said King, is that cyber attacks are increasingly affecting people’s “offline” lives, such as the power outages in Ukraine caused by cyber attacks. He noted that, according to Symantec, the Dragonfly hacking group potentially still has the capacity to control or sabotage European energy systems. “The internet of things [IoT] means that tens of billions more devices will go online, and in 2016, the Mirai malware attack highlighted IoT vulnerability, with hundreds of thousands of normal devices infected and turned into the world’s biggest botnet,” he said. The internet was designed and built on trust, said King. “Our challenge today is to retro-engineer security and security awareness into the system,” he said, noting that “too often” in the rush to get new devices to market, manufacturers “forget” security or do not give it enough importance. “That means devices never lose their easy-to-guess default passwords; it means the update policy is unclear; it means encryption not being used; and it means unnecessary ports, hardware, services and code that make the attack surface larger than it needs to be,” he said. According to King, all these things are “relatively straightforward” to sort out, but when they are attacked cumulatively, it has “deeply troubling implications for our collective digital security and, as a result, cyber threats are becoming more strategic, especially with the ability to endanger critical infrastructure, and they are becoming more ‘endemic’ – spreading from IT networks to the business-critical operations of other economic sectors”. Collective response A few days after the recent State of the Union speech by European Commission president Jean Claude Junker underlining the importance of tackling cyber threats, King said the EC had presented a package of proposals intended to reinforce a collective response based on resilience, deterrence and defence. “In all of these areas, we need to strengthen co-operation and we need to focus on international governance and international co-operation,” said King. “We urgently need to become more resilient. We need to make ourselves harder to attack, and we need to be quicker to respond.” To that end, he said, the EC is proposing an EU cyber security agency based on the existing Enisa network and information security agency to help drive up cyber security standards and ensure a rapid and co-ordinated response to attacks across the whole of the EU. Member states also need to fully implement the NIS directive, said King, to extend beyond critical sectors to other sectors at risk, starting with public administration, and to resource their computer incident response teams properly. “To further reinforce these efforts, the new cyber security agency will also implement an EU standards certification framework to drive up the level of cyber security by ensuring that products on the market are sufficiently cyber resilient,” he said. “We need to move to a world in which there are no default passwords on internet-connected devices, where all companies providing internet services and devices adhere to a vulnerability disclosure policy, and where connected devices and software are updatable for their entire lifespan.” Standards certification framework King said the new standards certification framework should promote new EU-wide schemes and procedures and create a comprehensive set of rules, requirements and standards to evaluate how secure digital products and services actually are. “But, given that 95% of attacks involve some human interaction with technology, building resilience also means changing behaviours to improve cyber hygiene…and having the right skills to drive technological innovation to stay ahead of attackers,” he said, pointing out that Europe is projected to have 350,000 unfilled cyber security jobs by 2022. “We need to mainstream cyber security education and training programmes and we need to invest in innovation,” said King. As well as improving resilience, he said, there is a need to create real and credible disincentives for attackers. “We need to make attacks easier to detect, trace, investigate and punish,” he said. But attribution is often difficult, said King, and for this reason, the EC is seeking to promote the uptake of Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6). “Under IPv6, you will only be able to allocate a single user per IP address,” he said, adding that the EC is also seeking to increase cooperation and sharing of cyber expertise and reinforcing forensic capabilities across the EU and within Europol “so that law enforcement can keep pace with criminals”. Strengthen cyber defence When it comes to defence, said King, the EC plans to explore whether the new EU Defence Fund could help to develop and strengthen cyber defence capabilities. “We want to team up with our partners, and the EU will deepen co-operation with Nato on cyber security, hybrid threats and cyber defence,” he said. “It is in our common interest.” Finally, King said that while the internet offers “enormous opportunities” for citizens, governments and international organisations, it also offers “unprecedented opportunities” for criminals, terrorists and other hostile actors. “We need to be alive to this risk, and we need to take steps together to counter these threats because by working together, we can boost resilience, drive technological innovation, increase deterrents, and harness international co-operation to promote our collective security,” he concluded. Source: http://www.computerweekly.com/news/450427879/Euro-commissioner-calls-for-more-collaboration-on-cyber-security

Link:
Euro commissioner calls for more collaboration on cyber security

DDoS attacks double as corporate data becomes new target

While more organisations are being hit by a DDoS attacks in 2017 compared to last year, less are being hit by more than one. DDoS attacks have increased in frequency in 2017, with 33 per cent of organisations having faced one this year compared to just 17 per cent in 2016. While DDoS attacks have been previously used to disable the operations of a target, the driving motivation to use it now is the theft of corporate data. Over a third of organisations having been hit by a DDoS attack this year, 20 per cent have been small businesses, 33 per cent medium, and 41 per cent have been in the enterprise category. Security provider Kaspersky is behind this data, with findings from its Global IT Security Risks Survey 2017. The damage inflicted by a DDoS attack may prove more long lasting than some might expect, with 26 per cent of businesses hit reporting a lasting impact on the performance of services. Russ Madley, Head of VSMB & channel at Kaspersky Lab UK, said: “While DDoS attacks have been a threat for many years, it’s still important that businesses take DDoS attacks seriously as they are one of the most popular weapons in a cybercriminal’s arsenal. They can be just as damaging to a business as any other cybercrime, especially if used as part of a bigger targeted attack.” It important to remember that DDoS attack can leave an organisation lame as it returns to regular activity, but an attack can also have a direct and immediate impact on reputation and the financial standing of a business. “The ramifications caused by these types of attacks can be far-reaching as they’re able to reach deep into a company’s internal systems. Organisations must understand that protection of the IT infrastructure requires a comprehensive approach and continuous monitoring, regardless of the company’s size or sphere of activity,” said Madley. While more organisations are facing DDoS attacks, the percentage of businesses hit by more than one has dropped this year to 76 per cent, a reduction from the 82 per cent that experienced more than one last year. Source: http://www.cbronline.com/news/cybersecurity/ddos-attacks-double-corporate-data-becomes-new-target/

View post:
DDoS attacks double as corporate data becomes new target

US SEC Corporate Filing System Said to Be Vulnerable to DDoS Attacks

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Wall Street’s top regulator, has discovered a vulnerability in its corporate filing database that could cause the system to collapse, according to an internal document seen by Reuters. The SEC’s September 22 memo reveals that its EDGAR database, containing financial reports from US public companies and mutual funds, could be at risk of “denial of service” attacks, a type of cyber intrusion that floods a network, overwhelming it and forcing it to close. The discovery came when the SEC was testing EDGAR’s ability to absorb monthly and annual financial filings that will be required under new rules adopted last year for the $18 trillion mutual fund industry. The memo shows that even an unintentional error by a company, and not just hackers with malicious intentions, could bring the system down. Even the submission of a large “invalid” form could overwhelm the system’s memory. The defect comes after the SEC’s admission last month that hackers breached the EDGAR database in 2016. The discovery will likely add to concerns about the vulnerability of the SEC’s network and whether the agency has been adequately addressing cyber threats. The mutual fund industry has long had concerns that market-sensitive data required in the new rules could be exploited if it got into the wrong hands. The industry has since redoubled its calls for SEC Chairman Jay Clayton to delay the data-reporting rules, set to go into effect in June next year, until it is reassured the information will be secure. “Clearly, the SEC should postpone implementation of its data reporting rule until the security of those systems is thoroughly tested and assessed by independent third parties,” said Mike McNamee, chief public communications officer of The Investment Company Institute (ICI), whose members manage $20 trillion worth of assets in the United States. “We are confident Chairman Clayton will live up to his pledge that the SEC will take whatever steps are necessary to ensure the security of its systems and the data it collects.” An SEC spokesman declined to comment. The rules adopted last year requiring asset managers to file monthly and annual reports about their portfolio holdings were designed to protect them in the event of a market crisis by showing the SEC and investors that they have enough liquidity to cover a rush of redemptions. During a Congressional hearing on Wednesday, Clayton testified that the agency was considering whether to delay the rules in light of the cyber concerns. He did not, however, mention anything about the denial of service attack vulnerability. Virtual vomit EDGAR is the repository for corporate America, housing millions of filings ranging from quarterly earnings to statements on acquisitions. It is a virtual treasure trove for cyber criminals who could trade on any information gleaned before it is publicly released. In the hack disclosed last month involving EDGAR, the SEC has said it now believes the criminals may have stolen non-public data for illicit trading. The vulnerability revealed in the September memo shows that even an invalid form could jam up EDGAR. The system did not immediately reject the form, the memo says. Rather, “it was being validated for hours before failing due to an invalid form type.” That conclusion could spell trouble for the SEC’s EDGAR database because it means that if hackers wanted to, they could “basically take down the whole EDGAR system” by submitting a malicious data file, said one cyber security expert with experience securing networks of financial regulators who reviewed the letter for Reuters. “The system would consume the data and essentially throw up on itself,” the person added. Source: http://gadgets.ndtv.com/internet/news/us-sec-corporate-filing-system-said-to-be-vulnerable-to-ddos-attacks-1759392

More:
US SEC Corporate Filing System Said to Be Vulnerable to DDoS Attacks

DDoS trends, DNS survey signal warnings to infosec pros

Two vendor reports out this week may be of interest to CISOs in planning their defensive strategies. —Imperva, a supplier of DDoS protection services, said it found a new attack tactic, nicknamed “pulse wave DDoS”, due to the traffic pattern it generates: A rapid succession of attack bursts that split a botnet’s attack output, enabling an offender to go after multiple targets. One such attack was also the largest network layer assault it mitigated in the second quarter peaked at 350 Gbps. –Meanwhile Infoblox Inc., which makes IP address management solutions, released a global survey finding that DNS security is often overlooked when it comes to cybersecurity strategy, with most companies inadequately prepared to defend against DNS attacks. Imperva’s announcement is included in its Q2 Global DDoS Threat Landscape report, on data from 2,618 network layer and 12,825 application layer DDoS attacks on customers’ Websites that use its services. The pulse wave DDoS tactic was described in an August blog , and researchers think it is designed to double a botnet’s output and exploit soft spots in “appliance first cloud second” hybrid mitigation solutions. “It wasn’t the first time we’ve seen attacks ramp up quickly. However, never before have we seen attacks of this magnitude peak with such immediacy, then be repeated with such precision. “Whoever was on the other end of these assaults, they were able to mobilize a 300Gbps botnet within a matter of seconds. This, coupled with the accurate persistence in which the pulses reoccurred, painted a picture of very skilled bad actors exhibiting a high measure of control over their attack resources.” Researchers suspect the tactic allows the threat actors behind it to switch targets on the fly. One suggested defence for organizations that have a DDoS mitigation provider is to double checking the ‘time to mitigation’ clause in the service level agreement. The report also notes two trends: First, the continued decline in network level attacks (at least for Imperva customers) and the continued increase (although in Q2 there was a slight dip) in application level attacks. Second, that the second quarter 75.9 percent of targets were subjected to multiple attacks—the highest percentage the company has seen. Number of targets subjected to repeat DDoS attacks. Imperva graphic The Infoblox global survey of over 1,000 security and IT professionals found respondents indicating that 86 per cent of those whose firms have DNS solutions said they failed to first alert teams of an occurring DNS attack, and nearly one-third of professionals doubted their company could defend against the next DNS attack. Twenty per cent of companies were first alerted to DNS attacks by customer complaints. In a release summarizing the survey (available here. Registration required), three out of 10 companies said they have already been victims of DNS attacks. Of those, 93 per cent have suffered downtime as a result of their most recent DNS attack. 40 percent were down for an hour or more, substantially impacting their business. Only 37 per cent of respondents said their companies were able to defend against all types of DNS attacks (hijacking, exploits, cache poisoning, protocol anomalies, reflection, NXDomain, amplification). Twenty-four per cent of respondents said their companies lost US $100,000 or more from their last DNS attack. “Most organizations regard DNS as simply plumbing rather than critical infrastructure that requires active defense,” Cricket Liu, chief DNS architect at Infoblox, said in the release. “Unfortunately, this survey confirms that, even on the anniversary of the enormous DDoS attack against Dyn—a dramatic object lesson in the effects of attacks on DNS infrastructure—most companies still neglect DNS security. Our approach to cybersecurity needs a fundamental shift: If we don’t start giving DNS security the attention it deserves, DNS will remain one of our most vulnerable Internet systems, and we’ll continue to see events like last year’s attack.” Source: https://www.itworldcanada.com/article/ddos-trends-dns-survey-signal-warnings-to-infosec-pros/397309

Visit link:
DDoS trends, DNS survey signal warnings to infosec pros

Pulse-Wave DDoS Attacks Mark a New Tactic in Q2

A new tactic for DDoS is gaining steam: the pulse wave attack. It’s called such due to the traffic pattern it generates—a rapid succession of attack bursts that split a botnet’s attack output. According to Imperva’s latest Global DDoS Threat Landscape Report, a statistical analysis of more than 15,000 network and application layer DDoS attacks mitigated by Imperva Incapsula’s services during Q2 2017, the largest network layer assault it mitigated peaked at 350Gbps. The tactic enables an offender to pin down multiple targets with alternating high-volume bursts. As such, it serves as the DDoS equivalent of hitting two birds with one stone, the company said. “A DDoS attack typically takes on a wave form, with a gradual ramp-up leading to a peak, followed by either an abrupt drop or a slow descent,” the company explained. “When repeated, the pattern resembles a triangle, or sawtooth waveform. The incline of such DDoS waves marks the time it takes the offenders to mobilize their botnets. For pulse wave attacks, a lack of a gradual incline was the first thing that caught our attention. It wasn’t the first time we’ve seen attacks ramp up quickly. However, never before have we seen attacks of this magnitude peak with such immediacy, then be repeated with such precision.” Whoever was on the other end of these assaults, they were able to mobilize a 300Gbps botnet within a matter of seconds, Imperva noted. This, coupled with the accurate persistence in which the pulses reoccurred, painted a picture of very skilled bad actors exhibiting a high measure of control over their attack resources. “We realized it makes no sense to assume that the botnet shuts down during those brief ‘quiet times’,” the firm said. “Instead, the gaps are simply a sign of offenders switching targets on-the-fly, leveraging a high degree of control over their resources. This also explained how the attack could instantly reach its peak. It was a result of the botnet switching targets on-the-fly, while working at full capacity. Clearly, the people operating these botnets have figured out the rule of thumb for DDoS attacks: moments to go down, hours to recover. Knowing that—and having access to an instantly responsive botnet—they did the smart thing by hitting two birds with one stone.” Pulse-wave attacks were carried out encountered on multiple occasions throughout the quarter, according to Imperva’s data. In the plus column, this quarter, there was a small dip in application layer attacks, which fell to 973 per week from an all-time high of 1,099 in Q1. However, don’t rejoice just quite yet. “There is no reason to assume that the minor decline in the number of application layer assaults is the beginning of a new trend,” said Igal Zeifman, Incapsula security evangelist at Imperva—noting the change was minor at best. Conversely, the quarter for the fifth time in a row saw a decrease in the number of network layer assaults, which dropped to 196 per week from 296 in the prior quarter. “The persistent year-long downtrend in the amount of network layer attacks is a strong sign of a shift in the DDoS threat landscape,” Zeifman said. “There are several possible reasons for this shift, one of which is the ever-increasing number of network layer mitigation solutions on the market. The commoditization of such services makes them more commonplace, likely driving attackers to explore alternative attack methods.” For instance one of the most prevalent trends Incapsula observed in the quarter was the increase in the amount of persistent application layer assaults, which have been scaling up for five quarters in a row. In the second quarter of the year, 75.9% of targets were subjected to multiple attacks—the highest percentage Imperva has ever seen. Notably, US-hosted websites bore the brunt of these repeat assaults—38% were hit six or more times, out of which 23% were targeted more than 10 times. Conversely, 33.6% of sites hosted outside of the US saw six or more attacks, while “only” 19.5% saw more than 10 assaults in the span of the quarter. “This increase in the number of repeat assaults is another clear trend and a testament to the ease with which application layer assaults are carried out,” Zeifman said. “What these numbers show is that, even after multiple failed attempts, the minimal resource requirement motivates the offenders to keep going after their target. Another point of interest was the unexpected spike in botnet activity out of Turkey, Ukraine and India. In Turkey, Imperva recorded more than 3,000 attacking devices that generated over 800 million attack requests, more than double the rate of last quarter. In Ukraine and India, it recorded 4,300 attacking devices, representing a roughly 75% increase from Q1 2017. The combined attack output of Ukraine and India was 1.45 billion DDoS requests for the quarter. Meanwhile, as the origin of 63% of DDoS requests in Q2 2017 and home to over 306,000 attacking devices, China retained its first spot on the list of attacking countries. Source: https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/pulsewave-ddos-attacks-mark-q2/

See the original article here:
Pulse-Wave DDoS Attacks Mark a New Tactic in Q2

As US launches DDoS attacks, N. Korea gets more bandwidth—from Russia

Fast pipe from Vladivostok gives N. Korea more Internet in face of US cyber operations. As the US reportedly conducts a denial-of-service attack against North Korea’s access to the Internet, the regime of Kim Jong Un has gained another connection to help a select few North Koreans stay connected to the wider world—thanks to a Russian telecommunications provider. Despite UN sanctions and US unilateral moves to punish companies that do business with the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, 38 North’s Martyn Williams reports that Russian telecommunications provider TransTelekom (????????????m) began routing North Korean Internet traffic at 5:30pm Pyongyang time on Sunday. The connection, Williams reported, offers a second route for traffic from North Korea’s Byol (“Star”) Internet service provider, which also runs North Korea’s cellular phone network. Byol offers foreigners in North Korea 1Mbps Internet access for €600 (US$660) a month (with no data caps). Up until now, all Byol’s traffic passed through a single link provided by China Unicom. But the new connection uses a telecommunications cable link that passes over the Friendship Bridge railway bridge—the only connection between North Korea and Russia. According to Dyn Research data, the new connection is now providing more than half of the route requests to North Korea’s networks. TransTelekom (sometimes spelled TransTeleComm) is owned by Russia’s railroad operator, Russian Railways. A Dyn Research chart showing the new routing data for North Korea’s ISP. According to a Washington Post report, The Department of Defense’s US Cyber Command had specifically targeted North Korea’s Reconnaissance General Bureau—the country’s primary intelligence agency—with a denial-of-service attack against the organization’s network infrastructure. That attack was supposed to end on Saturday, according to a White House official who spoke with the Post . While the unnamed official said the attack specifically targeted North Korea’s own hacking operations, North Korea has previously run those operations from outside its borders—from China. So it’s not clear whether the attack would have had any impact on ongoing North Korean cyberespionage operations. Source: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/10/as-us-launches-ddos-attacks-n-korea-gets-more-bandwidth-from-russia/

View post:
As US launches DDoS attacks, N. Korea gets more bandwidth—from Russia