Monthly Archives: April 2015

Cisco splats router bug that can lead to persistent DoS

Cisco has patched a vulnerability that affects Cisco ASR 9000 Series Aggregation Services Routers and can be exploited by a remote, unauthenticated attacker to effectively mount a denial of service at…

Read More:
Cisco splats router bug that can lead to persistent DoS

Asia-Plus’s website hit with DDoS attack again

The website of the Media Holding Asia-Plus has been hit with distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack again. The Asia-Plus’s website was hit with the DDoS attack on April 14.  Over the past ten days, it has already been the third attempt to make the website unavailable to its subscribers. The first DDoS attack o the Asia-Plus’s website was conducted on April 3 and it was conducted practically from all domestic Internet service providers.  Restoration of a stable work of the web-resource took nearly three days. The reasons for these DDoS attacks are still unknown because it is not clear who is behind these DDoS attacks.  However, it cannot be ruled out that a group of hackers has appeared who want to “test” steadiness of the site. In computing, a denial-of-service (DoS) or distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack is an attempt to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users. A DoS attack generally consists of efforts to temporarily or indefinitely interrupt or suspend services of a host connected to the Internet. As clarification, distributed denial-of-service attacks are sent by two or more people, or bots, and denial-of-service attacks are sent by one person or system.  As of 2014, the frequency of recognized DDoS attacks had reportedly reached an average rate of 28 per hour. Perpetrators of DoS attacks typically target sites or services hosted on high-profile web servers such as banks, credit card payment gateways, and even root name servers. Denial-of-service threats are also common in business, and are sometimes responsible for website attacks. This technique has now seen extensive use in certain games, used by server owners, or disgruntled competitors on games. Denial-of-service attacks are considered violations of the Internet Architecture Board’s Internet proper use policy, and also violate the acceptable use policies of virtually all Internet service providers.  They also commonly constitute violations of the laws of individual nations. Source: news.tj/en/news/asia-plus-s-website-hit-ddos-attack-again

More:
Asia-Plus’s website hit with DDoS attack again

Belgian media company experiences DDoS attack

Rossel, a Belgian media group, experienced a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack that stretched out for several hours Sunday. One of Belgium’s largest French-speaking newspapers, La Soir , along with others sites were affected and were temporarily shut down, according to report by Deutsche Welle . The attack occurred just days after pro-ISIS sympathizers launched a cyberattack against a French television network and Tunisian extremists took over a Belgian regional government website. Didier Hamann, director of Le Soir , tweeted that the perpetrator hadn’t yet been identified. Currently no evidence has been uncovered that links the attack to the one that crippled French TV station TV5 Monde. Hamann also noted that the station was regularly targeted by cyber threats, but “this time the firewall is not working as normal.” Source: http://www.scmagazine.com/ddos-attack-on-belgian-media-group-lasts-hours/article/408998/

See the original post:
Belgian media company experiences DDoS attack

Online gambling sites taken out by DDoS attacks

Customer of Betfair and PokerStars have been left enraged after the software of both gambling giants suffered from major connectivity issues over the weekend. Betfair’s sportsbook, betting exchange and websites were unavailable for more of April 13 after the firm’s servers came under attack from a Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attack . Betfair’s customer service team, manning the @BetfairHelpDesk Twitter account, confirmed to customers that a DDoS attack was the cause of the problems and reassured worried punters that their details and funds were safe. The attack seems to be either over or under control as I was able to log into all Betfair products on April 14. A DDoS attack is designed to temporarily or indefinitely interrupt or suspend the services offered by the targeted website. One way of achieving this is to bombard the site’s servers with so much bogus information and requests that it is overloaded and cannot respond to legitimate traffic requests. This appears to be what happened to Betfair on April 13. You may recall that partypoker was targeted by numerous DDoS attacks in October 2014 that resulted in some of its Pokerfest events being cancelled. The attacks at partypoker resurfaced in early December 2014 and saw the site effectively taken offline for several hours while its technicians and its Internet Service Provider (ISP) in Gibraltar combated the problem. Around the same time, 888poker was suffering similar connectivity problems – its servers are also in Gibraltar – but the London Stock Exchange (LSE) listed company refused to comment on whether or not it had been targeted by the same DDoS attacks that plagued partypoker. Poker sites are often reluctant to announce they are suffering from a hacker’s attempt to cause a DDoS because of the possible widespread panic the mention of a hacker could and would cause. Usually, the so-called hacker isn’t interested in attempting to obtain information – major online poker and gambling sites have these details secure under state-of-the-art systems – they are attempting to disrupt the targeted site’s business. Although neither confirmed or denied by its management team, rumours of PokerStars being under a DDoS attack have been doing the rounds on various forums, including Two Plus Two. Players have been reporting major lag (low response when clicking buttons etc) and connectivity problems when attempting to play at PokerStars since April 9. The problems seem to be global, although resident of Belgium seem to be more severely affected judging by tweets from various Belgians including Friend of PokerStars Pierre Neuville and PokerStars’ Belgian Twitter account on April 12, although a more recent update claims all problems Pokerstars.be were facing are now resolved. While PokerStars does appear to be on top of the problems now, its Network Status panel shows it has Very Good connection at five of the six listed hosts, although Manx Telecom, Isle of Man has 0% connection and all packets of data being sent to it are currently being lost.   Source: http://uk.pokernews.com/news/2015/04/betfair-and-pokerstars-suffer-major-connectivity-problems-17360.htm?utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=homefeed&utm_source=rss

See the article here:
Online gambling sites taken out by DDoS attacks

Betat Casino Suffers DDoS Attacks

Betat Casino, a popular international online gaming destination, has been subject to Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks by yet unidentified hackers, the specialty press reports. The hackers are apparently trying to extort the operator for Bitcoins. The website has made an announcement to its players complaining about their crippled service, in which they revealed the attack and the fact that the hackers wanted 10 bitcoins (currently about $2500) to stop the attack. “ This attack was vicious, massive and wide spread and hit our entire range of sub-nets, even our CDN has been compromised (Content Delivery Network) as well as our AWS (Amazon’s Cloud Service), ” a Betat spokesperson commented on the attack. “To say that 45Gbps of bandwidth is a lot is a gross understatement. These hackers have massive capacity and are highly organized. Luckily, we are well equipped to handle these kinds of attacked and while nothing of this magnitude has been recorded on both our front, nor on the service providers experience, we are highly confident that by end of the week we will have the situation under full control. That said, the next 5-7 days will be rough and our customers may experience times of inconsistent performance.” In computing, a denial-of-service (DoS) or distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack is an attempt to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users. A DoS attack generally consists of efforts to temporarily or indefinitely interrupt or suspend services of a host connected to the Internet. Basically, it floods the targeted servers with huge loads of data, making them function much slower or not available at all to its users. According to the information available on the internet, these types of attacks are either initiated by groups of hackers with their own agenda, or they can be “ordered” through the dark web for as low as $150. Source: http://casinolocale.net/betat-casino-suffers-ddos-attacks/

More here:
Betat Casino Suffers DDoS Attacks

The “Great Cannon”: How China Turns Its Web-sites Into Cyberweapons

When anti-Chinese censorship services got hit with a crippling distributed-denial-of-service attack last month, researchers promptly pegged China as the culprit. Now, Citizen Lab has pinpointed the Chinese tool that produced this attack occur. They’re calling… When anti-Chinese censorship services got hit with a crippling distributed-denial-of-service attack last month, researchers promptly pegged China as the culprit. Now, Citizen Lab has pinpointed the Chinese tool that produced this attack occur. They’re calling it the Fantastic Cannon. Separate from but positioned within China’s Wonderful Firewall, this “Great Cannon” injects malicious code as a way to enforce state censorship, by working with cyberattacks to damage solutions that help folks inside China see banned content. The Excellent Cannon is not merely an extension of the Fantastic Firewall, but a distinct attack tool that hijacks website traffic to (or presumably from) person IP addresses, and can arbitrarily replace unencrypted content material as a man-in-the-middle. With this most recent DDoS attack, the Wonderful Cannon worked by weaponizing the internet site visitors of visitors to Baidu or any website that utilised Baidu’s comprehensive ad network. This suggests any one visiting a Baidu-affiliated from anyplace in the planet was vulnerable to obtaining their internet visitors hijacked and turned into a weapon to flood anti-censorship internet sites with too a lot targeted traffic. This distinct attack had a narrow target: Particular web sites recognized to circumvent Chinese censorship. But Citizen Lab thinks the Terrific Cannon could be utilised in a substantially broader way. Due to the fact it is capable of making a complete-blown man-in-the-middle attack, it could be made use of to intercept unencrypted emails, for example. The attack launched by the Good Cannon seems somewhat apparent and coarse: a denial-of-service attack on services objectionable to the Chinese government. However the attack itself indicates a far far more significant capability: an potential to “exploit by IP address”. This possibility, not yet observed but a function of its architecture, represents a potent cyberattack capability. As Citizen Lab’s researchers note, it’s fairly strange that China would show off this strong weapon by applying it in such a pointed attack. Conducting such a widespread attack clearly demonstrates the weaponization of the Chinese Online to co-opt arbitrary computer systems across the net and outside of China to obtain China’s policy ends. The only silver lining here is that this could prompt a far more urgent push to switch to HTTPS, given that the Good Cannon only operates on HTTP. This attack tends to make it painfully apparent that utilizing HTTPS isn’t just a smart safeguard— it is a required precaution against effective state-sponsored cyberattacks. Source: http://www.eaglecurrent.com/technology/the-quotgreat-cannonquot-how-china-turns-its-web-sites-into-cyberweapons-h4121.html

Read more here:
The “Great Cannon”: How China Turns Its Web-sites Into Cyberweapons

Cybercrime taskforce collects huge botnet scalp on first go

Beebone deboned by the Joint Cybercrime Action Taskforce A sophisticated botnet has been neutered by a consortium starring the Dutch National High Tech Crime Unit and the Joint Cybercrime Action Taskforce.…

Read More:
Cybercrime taskforce collects huge botnet scalp on first go

NH State Website Knocked Out

Company that hosts site dealing with “distributed denial of service” attack on its servers New Hampshire’s state government website was inaccessible to some users for several hours because the outside company that hosts it was dealing with another “distributed denial of service” attack on its servers. The governor’s office says the main state government website, nh.gov, and websites for at least several state agencies were disrupted Thursday morning. On March 23, the state’s tourism website, visitnh.gov, was briefly inaccessible for the same reason. State officials and others are working to determine more details about what caused the problem, but say no information was compromised. Source: http://www.necn.com/news/new-england/NH-State-Website-Knocked-Out–299194531.html

Originally posted here:
NH State Website Knocked Out

Polymorphic Beebone botnet sinkholed in international police operation

On April 8, a global operation targeted the Beebone (also known as AAEH) botnet, a polymorphic downloader bot which installs various forms of malware on victims’ computers. Initial figures show tha…

Visit link:
Polymorphic Beebone botnet sinkholed in international police operation