Monthly Archives: June 2012

Distributed Denial of Service ‘DDoS’ becoming more ‘sophisticated’, damaging

Distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) have matured with hackers blending different attack techniques and becoming more damaging, observers note. They add that defenses need to evolve to complement infrastructure security that has already been commoditized.” DDoS attacks, where multiple compromised systems usually infected with a Trojan virus, are used to target a single system have been getting more “sophisticated” over the years, Vic Mankotia, security vice president of CA Technologies Asia-Pacific and Japan, noted. Today, there are DDoS attacks coming from automated systems, payloads delivered from USB sticks and protocols such as Bluetooth and magnetic strips of cards, he observed. In the past, DDoS attacks primarily targeted networks using low-level protocol or volumetric attacks, Eric Chan, regional technical director of Fortinet Southeast Asia and Hong Kong, remarked. However, hackers today use a combination of volumetric and application-layer attacking techniques, he noted. An application-layer DDoS targets the application service by using legitimate requests to overload the server, and rather than flood a network with traffic or session, they target specific applications and slowly exhaust resources at the application layer, Chan explained. They can be very “effective” at low traffic rates, which makes them harder to detect, he added. The Sony Playstation breach for example, had been a result of application-layer DDoS attacks, able to camouflage a data breach of over 77 million customer records, he cited. Evolved with IT trends, hackers intent On a basic level, denial-of-service (DoS) has evolved from “taking a pair of wire cutters outside the organization and snipping those wires” 20 years ago, to becoming distributed DoS where “hundreds and thousands of” traffic making computers into botnets to shut down systems, Andrew Valentine, managing principal of investigative response at Verizon observed. Strong connectivity, data centers and cloud, have given mobility center-stage, paved way for the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) trend making the security parameters “disappear”, Mankotia explained. While mobile devices may not store the target information, but they do allow the DDoS attackers access to the information they seek, he noted. Laptops and devices also have a lot more computing power compared to those in the past, Claudio Scarabello, global security product manager of Verizon added. As such, hardware have a lot more power to flood systems, and can be much more “damaging”, he warned. Another way it has evolved is through the intent, Valentine added. In the past, DDoS had stemmed from “bragging rights”–showing off one’s ability to hack into the server, as well as financial intents, he explained. Today, it is used for political intents, commonly known as hacktivism, and DDoS and data breaches have become “synonymous”, he added, citing the Verizon 2012 data breach investigation report which found a rise in hacktivism against large organizations. “As such, DDoS today is associated with political intent, and making a statement, and not about script kiddies showing off anymore,” he said. Security system with visibility, multi-layered defense needed What is needed is a different type of security to complement the infrastructure security that has already been commoditized–a security system which enables the knowledge of where and who is sharing the data, Mankotia pointed out. DDoS attacks are heavily customized with a signature to get specific information, and security has to evolve as all information is not equal, and all identities, access and system must be in one ecosystem, where content-aware identity and access management are applied and advanced authentication is at its core, he explained. As botnets can send huge amounts of legitimate connections and requests from each compromised machine, and determining whether such connections are valid or not will be crucial, enterprises will need security solutions with “sufficient visibility and context”, Chan added. “These systems should have sufficient visibility and context to detect a wide range of attack types without slowing the flow, and processing of legitimate traffic, and is then able to conduct mitigation in the most effective manner,” he said. Above of, a multi-layer defense strategy is also essential, and the defense strategy must cover both network-layer and application-layer attacks, Chan surmised. In need of protection click here DDoS protection . Source: http://www.zdnetasia.com/ddos-becoming-more-sophisticated-damaging-62305134.htm

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Distributed Denial of Service ‘DDoS’ becoming more ‘sophisticated’, damaging

Breaking Down a DDoS Attack

Distributed Denial of Service attacks have one goal, to make their target unavailable to its users. And there are certainly a number of different ways these attacks can be carried out. Some of the more common DDoS techniques used by attackers include the use of malware to infect computers used to attack their target from a variety of different sources. One of the most well known examples of a Distributed Denial of Service attack is the infamous MyDoom worm that was sent by email spammers and infected the recipient’s computers. The malware targeted domains with a flood of traffic at a predetermined date and time to bring the site down as it could not handle the flood of incoming connections. More commonly, DDoS attack make use of botnets where computers are turned into zombies, after being infected with malware, and are controlled by a central computer. These botnets can then be used to launch the attack against a target of the attacker’s choosing. The numbers inside and attack But just what does it take to launch a successful DDoS attack? How many computers does an attacker use? How much bandwidth to they need to consume? What is the number of connections it takes to successfully bring a web application down? A recent attack gives us a look into these numbers. While it was not the largest DDoS attack ever launched against a website or web application, a recent week long attack against an Asian e-commerce company in early November was the largest attack in 2011. So just what does it take to bring down an e-commerce platform? Let’s take a look: 250,000 zombie computers coming from a variety of botnets. This is an estimated number based on similar attacks in the past and on the amount of traffic and connections that were used to disable the e-commerce platform that was targeted. The number of computers used in previous attacks were easier to estimate as often times, one large botnet was used in the attack. However since large botnets like Rustock and Cutwail were taken down cybercriminals have gotten wise to larger botnets attracting too much attention so the trend it to use smaller botnets, under 50,000 infected computers, and combining them to launch large scale attacks. 45 Gigabytes per second. At its peak, this DDoS attack flooded the company’s site with up to 45 Gbps. To accomplish this, the botnets’ zombie computers sent an average of 69 million packets per second. While this number is rather disturbing for a network engineer, it isn’t the worst consumption of bandwidth ever used in a DDoS attack. In 2010 the 100 Gbps threshold was broken. If this doesn’t seem overly threatening, consider the fact that 100 Gbps used in a DDoS attack shows an 102% increase of bandwidth consumed by these threats over the course of one year and a 1000% increase in bandwidth use since 2005. Yet while the bandwidth consumed in the largest attack of 2011 is significantly lower than that of the previous year’s attack it doesn’t mean that the scope of the problem is decreasing. In fact, the 2011 attack was much more complex as six different attack signatures were used to attack Layer 3, the network layer, and the application Layer, 7. The sophistication of this dual layered attack required less bandwidth to do just as much damage. 15,000 connections per second. 15,000 connections equals that many people trying to connect to a web site, or web application. Not even the most naive, or aggressive, company would think that they had that many people trying to connect to their e-commerce platform every second. This equals 1,296,000,000 connections in a 24 hour period. That much activity can bring some pretty impressive devices to their knees. So far, the name of the company has not been released due to confidentiality agreements. The reason for the attack also remains unclear. Insiders do believe, however, that the attack was launched by a disgruntled user or a competitor looking to gain an edge in the marketplace using industrial sabotage. Regardless of the reason it is clear that the scale and sophistication of DDoS threats continues to grow. In cases like these above it’s always best to have the best DDoS protection .

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Breaking Down a DDoS Attack

Accused British hacker launch DDoS attack and charged in U.S. over LulzSec attacks

A federal grand jury in Los Angeles has indicted a 20-year-old British citizen on charges related to attacks by the LulzSec hacking group on the Fox and PBS television networks and Sony’s film and TV studio, authorities said on Wednesday. Ryan Cleary, who is already jailed in the United Kingdom where he faces prosecution over similar charges, is accused of joining other members of LulzSec in harnessing compromised computers, known as a “botnet,” to steal confidential information, deface websites or attack servers. He was indicted on Tuesday. “Cleary is a skilled hacker. He controlled his own botnet, employed sophisticated methods and his broad geographic scope affected a large number of businesses and individuals,” FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller said. LulzSec, an offshoot of the international hacking group Anonymous, has taken credit for hacking attacks on government and private sector websites. Anonymous and its offshoots, including LulzSec and AntiSec, initially focused on fighting attempts at Internet regulation and the blocking of free illegal downloads, but have since taken on such targets as Scientology and the global banking system. The charges come just over two months after accused LulzSec hacker Cody Kretsinger pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles to taking part in an extensive computer breach of Sony Corp’s Sony Pictures Entertainment. In March, court documents revealed that Anonymous leader “Sabu,” whose real name is Hector Xavier Monsegur, had pleaded guilty to hacking-related charges and provided the FBI with information on fellow hackers. According to the indictment released by the FBI, Cleary and his unnamed co-conspirators hacked into the computer systems of News Corp’s Fox Entertainment Group and Sony Pictures Entertainment and stole confidential user information. The indictment also charges Cleary and his co-conspirators of defacing the PBS website and launching “denial of service” attacks against an online gaming website and Britain’s Serious Organized Crime Agency. Cleary is charged with one count of conspiracy and two counts of unauthorized impairment of a protected computer. He faces a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison if convicted. Eimiller said federal authorities would “allow the prosecution to take its course” against Cleary overseas before deciding whether to seek his extradition to the United States. He is next scheduled to be in court in the U.K. on June 25. Anonymous, and LulzSec in particular, became notorious in late 2010 when they launched what they called the “first cyber war” in retaliation for attempts to shut down the WikiLeaks website. They attacked websites including those of MasterCard Inc, which had tried to block payments to WikiLeaks after apparent pressure from the U.S. government following the release of thousands of diplomatic cables. Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/14/net-us-usa-lulzsec-hacking-idUSBRE85D00620120614

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Accused British hacker launch DDoS attack and charged in U.S. over LulzSec attacks

“Armenpress” prevented Distributed Denial of Service ‘DDoS’ hacker attack

DDos (Distributed Denial of Service) attack took place in order to thwart the works of “Armenpress” Armenian news agency website, which was prevented by IT specialists of the agency. Earlier Armenpress web site has been attacked. The agency learnt about the hacker attack on June 13 night and informed the enforcement bodies. Armenpress staff continues its work: the agency’s customers receive the news with its full volume. Thanks to the efforts of Armenpress IT specialists the security of agency has been intensified: currently works are carried out to determine the reasons of hacker attack. “Armenpress” expresses gratitude to its colleagues for the support and condemns any kind of hacker attack, qualifying it as a crime in all respects. Source: http://armenpress.am/eng/news/684393/%E2%80%9Carmenpress%E2%80%9D-prevented-ddos-hacker-attack.html

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“Armenpress” prevented Distributed Denial of Service ‘DDoS’ hacker attack

Azerbaijani and Turkish hackers hit Armenian websites with Denial of Service ‘DDoS’ attacks

Last night Azerbaijani hackers attacked BlogNews.am, Armenpress.am websites, and Turkish hackers attacked Beeline.am website. Information security specialist Samvel Martirosyan informed about this. Armenpress.am and Beeline.am websites aren’t functioning at present. According to the information circulated by BlogNews.am, a significant part of the information on the website was deleted because of the hackers’ actions. At this moment, the website’s administration is trying to recover the deleted information. Source: http://www.yerkirmedia.am/?act=news&lan=en&id=7791

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Azerbaijani and Turkish hackers hit Armenian websites with Denial of Service ‘DDoS’ attacks

Mascow protest against President Vladimir Putin led to indeptendent Russian websites hit with distributed denial-of-service ‘DDoS’ attack

More than 100,000 protesters on Tuesday joined a march against President Vladimir Putin in central Moscow, organizer and radical left-wing activist Sergei Udaltsov told AFP news agency. “There are more than 100,000 people,” Udaltsov said at the rally, called the March of Millions, which police said had drawn 18,000 people. City authorities allowed up to 50,000 to take part in Tuesday’s event, which coincides with the patriotic Russia Day holiday marking the country’s 1990 declaration of independence from Soviet rule. Moscow police said they were sending 12,000 riot officers and interior ministry troops onto the streets of the capital to keep order. The march will take protesters down Moscow’s Boulevard Ring toward Sakharov Avenue, scene of a dramatic demonstration last December against the outcome of disputed parliamentary elections that month. Meanwhile, independent Russian news websites went offline on Tuesday in a suspected attack by pro-government groups, as protesters gathered in Moscow for a march against President Vladimir Putin’s third Kremlin term. The site of the Moscow Echo radio station went down about a half hour before protesters started to gather on central Pushkin Square. The Dozhd (Rain) TV website and that of the prominent opposition Novaya Gazeta twice-weekly newspaper also could not be accessed as the event officially got under way at 0800 GMT. But the websites of Russia’s main media sources ? including Kremlin-allied papers and state-controlled television stations ? were all accessible and operating without delay. A Dozhd newscaster said their station’s website was the victim of a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack of unknown origin. Opposition leaders have been previously blamed attacks on Russian independent media sources on pro-Putin youth groups. A similar attack, which included the inaccessibility of the same websites during the disputed December parliamentary election, was reported but no one claimed responsibility for that attack, AFP reported. The United States on Monday voiced concern after Russian police raided the homes of top protest leaders ahead of the planned mass rally in Moscow. “The United States is deeply concerned by the apparent harassment of Russian political opposition figures on the eve of the planned demonstrations on June 12,” State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland told reporters. Police armed with assault rifles carried out a coordinated sweep of the homes of young Russian politicians, who analysts believe represent the biggest threat to ex-KGB spy Putin’s 12-year rule. Nuland also criticized a new law in Russia that imposes “disproportionate penalties” for violating rules on public demonstrations. Russian police were calling in opposition leaders for questioning one hour prior to the planned rally time on Tuesday in a move “clearly designed to take them off the streets during the demonstration,” she said. “Taken together, these measures raise serious questions about the arbitrary use of law enforcement to stifle free speech and free assembly,” she said. Source: http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/06/12/220172.html

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Mascow protest against President Vladimir Putin led to indeptendent Russian websites hit with distributed denial-of-service ‘DDoS’ attack

Wawa’s website under suddle DDoS attack

Hackers caused problems for Wawa’s website, www.wawa.com, late Friday, although it appeared to be back to normal by Saturday. Some visitors to the convenience retailer’s site did not see the usual images of hoagies and smoothies and gasoline promotions. Instead, those images were replaced with a cartoon of Adolf Hitler and the name of the group claiming responsibility, UGNazi. According to a report by The Daily Times, Wawa.com visitors were met with a black screen reading “Welcome Nazis, Targets & Reasons” and the drawing of Hitler. Beneath the group’s name was a list of individuals who allegedly hacked the site: Arya Ebrahimi, Justin Martin, Alex Irvin and Thomas Ryan. The group included a link to follow it on Twitter. UGNazi tweeted about high gasoline prices and plans to also hack the convenience store’s gasoline pumps, reported CBS Philly. According to a Courier Post report, the group tweeted, “How much ?#havoc would be caused by shutting down all of the Wawa gas pumps? Love having access to the gas control relay centers .” In a statement provided to CSP Daily News on Saturday, Wawa public relations director Lori Bruce said, “Please be assured that we have no evidence to indicate our website has been breached. Images on our website were not replaced;  however, a domain name server is being intermittently redirected to a nonlegitimate webpage. We have rectified the situation with our domain registrar, but it may take another 24 hours to propagate to all domain name servers. Until then, people trying to visit Wawa.com may see a page other than Wawa.com.” (The website seemed to be displaying normally by Saturday, with no trace of the bogus page evident.) “Unfortunately, today, many well-known brands have become targets for online mischief or worse. We will continue to actively monitor and report this to the proper authorities,” Bruce added. “This obviously had nothing to do with Wawa and it is certainly not something we condone,” she told the Courier-Post. “We will be working with authorities to get to the bottom of this.” Pennsylvania State Police told the paper that the hacking would fall under the purview of the Internet Crimes Task Force. “We did this not only for the fame but for the ‘lulz’ [“laugh out louds”] and the fact that Wawa has scorching high gas prices and receives many complaints daily,” Cosmo, one of the UGNazi hackers, told technology website Softpedia.com. He claimed that the group has gained access to the websites entire database, but that it has not found anything valuable to leak. According to Wikipedia, UGNazi, also known as the Underground Nazi Hacktivist Group, is a computer hacker group that has claimed responsibility for several attacks conducted over the Internet. It is best known for its “Tango Down” distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on U.S. government websites and for leaking the personal information of government officials. The Wawa, Pa.-based c-store chain operates 594 stores in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia, of which 311 sell fuel. Source: http://www.cspnet.com/news/technology/articles/wawas-website-hacked

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Wawa’s website under suddle DDoS attack

Security fears for ACT’s govt files

The ACT government’s computer systems fought off more than a million attempts to compromise their security in the nine months to April, the territory’s auditor-general has found. And despite a ”denial of service” attack on a key government website just as the audit was coming to an end, auditor Maxine Cooper has found the territory’s information security system is ”robust”. But Dr Cooper’s report found 95 per cent of the 1025 information management systems in the government’s sprawling network were not complying with the requirement to have a security plan and even fewer had undertaken a threat-and-risk assessment. Advertisement: Story continues below Dr Cooper’s office audited the government’s computer network nine months before March, but as the audit period came to a close, the Justice and Community Safety Directorate’s website came under successful attack. The department, which holds sensitive information from the city’s justice agencies, was targeted by the Anonymous group in what is believed to be a case of mistaken identity. The hackers appeared to believe they were attacking the Australian ”justice department”, protesting the federal government’s attitude toward WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Dr Cooper warned that unauthorised accessing of information held by the government, including health and medical records, criminal records, case management records and sensitive government documents could cause strategic damage. But Dr Cooper found successful attacks were externally exceptional in an otherwise good security record for the territory but which could be improved if all government websites were internally hosted. ”The protection of the ACT government network is robust,” the Auditor-General said yesterday. ”Shared Services ICT Security Section’s security regime has successfully defended against over one million attempts to access the ACT government’s network in the nine-month period to 31 March, 2012. ”Future similar breaches could be minimised if all directorate and agency websites were hosted on the ACT government network ran ACT government endorsed supplier.” Dr Cooper also wants to see improvements, including more IT bureaucrats reading up on the essential documents governing security. ”While the administrative structures and processes that support whole and procedures are overall satisfactory there are some shortcomings,” Dr Cooper said. ”ICT security governance is based on the Protective Security Policy and Guidelines which is the ACT government’s pre-eminent protective security document. ”However it is unclear if the status of this document is well understood or if adequate processes exist to ensure that directorates and agencies are complying with it.” The auditor was also unhappy with a failure to put plans in place to secure information management systems in the government network ”Despite it being a requirement, only 5 per cent of the ACT government’s 1025 information management systems have a system security plan; and even fewer, some 2.24 per cent have a threat-and-risk assessment,” she said. Source: http://www.canberratimes.com.au/act-news/security-fears-for-acts-govt-files-20120608-201v5.html

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Security fears for ACT’s govt files

North Korea ships malware-infected games to South Korean users, uses them to launch DDoS attacks

According to an independent report published in Korea’s JoongAng Daily, Seoul’s Metropolitan Police Agency has intercepted a cyber attack plot orchestrated by North Korea’s Reconnaissance General Bureau, which successfully shipped malware-infected games to South Korean users which were later on used to launch a DDoS attack against the web site of Incheon Airport. More details: According to the police, the South Korean man, identified by the surname Jo, traveled to Shenyang, northeastern China, starting in September 2009 and met agents of an alleged North Korean trading company. He allegedly asked them to develop game software to be used in the South. Jo purchased dozens of computer game software for tens of millions of won, which was a third the cost of the same kind of software in the South. The games were infected with malignant viruses, of which Jo knew, an official at the police agency said. Jo sold the games to South Korean operators of online games. When people played the games, the viruses used their computers as zombies, through which the cyberattack was launched. This is the second attempt by North Korea in recent months to engage in electronic warfare with South Korea, following the use of GPS jammers causing difficulties in air and marine traffic controls. What’s particularly interesting about North Korea’s infection vector in this campaign, is that it’s not a novel approach to spread malware. Instead, it relies on a chain of trust, from the unknown origin of the produced games, to the sellers claims that they are malware-free, and ultimately targets bargain hunters. In the past, software piracy has proven to be a key driving force behind the growth of malware campaigns internationally. Distribution of malware-infected games greatly reminds me of a case which happened in Eastern Europe in the 90s where a malware coder participating in a popular IT magazine’s coding contest, on purposely backdoored his game, which ended being shipped to thousands of subscribers on a magazine-branded CD. Although a good example of a flawed QA (Quality Assurance) on behalf of the magazine, South Korean authorities claim that the person who purchased the games actually knew that they were infected with malware, hence the lower price for purchasing them. Just how big of a cyber threat is North Korea? It’s an emerging market player, having actively invested in the concept over the years, that’s for sure. In my recent conversation with cyber warfare expert Jeffrey Carr, he pointed out that he doubts Russia or China will knowingly supply the irrational North Korea with cyber warfare ‘know how’. However, Russia or China’s chain of command doesn’t need to know that this outsourcing will ever take place, as North Korea could easily outsource to sophisticated cybercriminals doing it for the money, not for the fame. Summary: Seoul’s Metropolitan Police Agency has intercepted a cyber attack plot orchestrated by North Korea’s Reconnaissance General Bureau, which successfully shipped malware-infected games to South Korean users. Source: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/security/north-korea-ships-malware-infected-games-to-south-korean-users-uses-them-to-launch-ddos-attacks/12383

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North Korea ships malware-infected games to South Korean users, uses them to launch DDoS attacks

Anonymous’ open letter to Indian govt claims DDoS attack on sites are legal

Last night hacktivist group Anonymous sent out an open letter to the government of India criticizing the government and ISP companies for blocking torrent and video sharing websites. While doing so, the group clarified the definition of a DDoS attack, a type of online attack the group has been ravaging against government websites. Less of a threatening letter and more of a Hacking 101 course book for the government and mainstream media alike, Anonymous clarified that a DDoS attack is not a hack, which is legally defined as unauthorized access to a network. In fact, a DDoS attack is overflowing the server capacity by an excess of user traffic, or in simpler terms a traffic jam of sorts occurs at website server due to the enormous traffic attracted, in this case the large influx of anonymous group members. Anonymous believes this is a peaceful way to protest the government blocks and also states how websites were blocked when there was no court order asking for specific sites to be blocked like the Air India employee Facebook protest pages. The group has made its intentions clear to go after the government and its supporters, the ISPs that are blocking access to torrents and some other sites like Vimeo. It is also urging Indians to participate in peaceful demonstrations across the country on June 9. In meantime read the whole letter below. Source: http://www.bgr.in/news/anonymous-open-letter-to-indian-govt-claims-ddos-attack-on-sites-are-legal/

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Anonymous’ open letter to Indian govt claims DDoS attack on sites are legal