Who Is Trying To Disrupt The Internet?

A prolonged Internet outage affecting major sites like Twitter, Netflix, Spotify and The New York Times recently has commentators concerned that this is was a practice run for future, more widespread disruption of the internet.

The distributed denial of service attack (DDoS) targeted the dynamic domain name service provider Dyn and came in three waves during the day.

Dyn provides internet address translation through DNS servers to take a name like www.nytimes.com and translate it into an address like 170.149.159.130. Denial of service attacks use a variety of techniques to keep the DNS servers busy. The attacks work by flooding DNS servers with millions of requests that seem legitimate but are for fake addresses, causing the DNS server to get overloaded. Real DNS requests from real users can’t get through and so it appears that the site they are trying to get to, like www.netflix.com is down.

DNS attacks operate in a number of different ways but those that affected the Dyn servers were using a range of techniques that included sending requests for sites that had random characters attached to the start of a valid domain e.g. abcd123.nytimes.com. Because these addresses are essentially valid, the DNS server tries to look the up the address but gets tied up because of the sheer volume of requests. The attacks are difficult to guard against because the requests are essentially valid.

The sheer volume of requests were being sent in part by the Mirai botnet of Internet of Things devices, mostly internet connected cameras and digital video recorders. This botnet has been in a previous attack this month on the website of a security reporter Brian Krebs.

These types of attacks have been occurring more frequently and because they involve pieces of internet infrastructure, have a more widespread impact. Last month, security analyst Bruce Schneier wrote that he believed that state actors were increasingly probing for weaknesses in the basic infrastructure of the internet in order to be able to mount large-scale devastating attacks. Because of the increase in number and intensity of DDoS type attacks in recent years, security analysts have theorised that some of the attacks are masking probing for vulnerabilities.

A particular fear is that a DDoS attack could prevent people from voting online during the US election on November 8th. Overseas military and citizens are allowed to vote online in several US states and everyone in Alaska can vote online. Russia has already been implicated in the hack of Democratic National Committee emails and organizing their release through WikiLeaks. There is concern that the Russians will try and discredit the election process in whatever way they can and disrupting it through a DDoS attack on the day would be one way of achieving this.

The risk of this actually effecting the vote on the day has been dismissed however as the window for voting online in some of these situations is weeks before the election rather than on the day. When Alabama trialed online electronic voting during the primaries, their site was in fact attacked, but although it slowed down the site, it didn’t prevent anyone from voting.

There is also the possibility that this attack was actually just hackers going after a particular site that happened to be using the Dyn service. The source code for the Mirai botnet was released on October 1st and since that time, other hackers have been using the code to expand the number of bots involved and create their own botnets. DDoS attacks may actually just be hackers testing out the power of their creations.

The internet remains incredibly vulnerable to attacks on its infrastructure and right now, there are few ways of avoiding them. Because Internet of Things devices like cameras, digital video recorders, and a whole range of other equipment are being used as vehicles to launch DDoS attacks, making sure that the devices are secure would be a priority. However, manufacturers are creating these devices in a way that doesn’t allow for automated, un-monitored updates which is what is really required for security patches to be applied when they are discovered. Governments could potentially legislate that they should take all efforts to ensure their devices are secure before allowing the public to connect them to the internet, but this would need all countries of the world to do this.

It does bring into question the ability of governments to put even more of its interface with the public online since as soon as it does, it becomes a potential target for malicious actors. Governments in particular need to become more adept at dealing with this possibility, especially after the Australian Bureau of Statistics demonstrated that it was unable to run an online census collection successfully in the face of relatively minor DDoS attacks.

Science2.0

« China’s Plan To Organise Society Using Big Data
Strategies For A Cyber Security Culture (£) »

CyberSecurity Jobsite
Perimeter 81

Directory of Suppliers

DigitalStakeout

DigitalStakeout

DigitalStakeout enables cyber security professionals to reduce cyber risk to their organization with proactive security solutions, providing immediate improvement in security posture and ROI.

Cyber Security Supplier Directory

Cyber Security Supplier Directory

Our Supplier Directory lists 6,000+ specialist cyber security service providers in 128 countries worldwide. IS YOUR ORGANISATION LISTED?

Resecurity, Inc.

Resecurity, Inc.

Resecurity is a cybersecurity company that delivers a unified platform for endpoint protection, risk management, and cyber threat intelligence.

MIRACL

MIRACL

MIRACL provides the world’s only single step Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) which can replace passwords on 100% of mobiles, desktops or even Smart TVs.

NordLayer

NordLayer

NordLayer is an adaptive network access security solution for modern businesses — from the world’s most trusted cybersecurity brand, Nord Security. 

Global Secure Solutions (GSS)

Global Secure Solutions (GSS)

Global Secure Solutions is an IT security and risk consulting firm and authorised ISO training partner for the PECB.

maCERT

maCERT

maCERT is the national Computer Emergency Response Team for Morocco.

Avira

Avira

Avira provide a portfolio of antivirus, security and performance applications for Windows, Android, Mac, and iOS.

Avatao

Avatao

Avatao is an online training platform for building secure software, offering a rich library of hands-on IT security exercises for software engineers to teach secure programming.

Cyber Defense Initiative Conference (CDIC)

Cyber Defense Initiative Conference (CDIC)

Cyber Defense Initiative Conference (CDIC) is one of the most distinguished Cybersecurity, Privacy and Information Security Conference in Thailand and Southeast Asia.

Yelbridges

Yelbridges

Yelbridges is your reliable partner in all fields of IT-Security, from developing of Security Policies and Guidelines to the design and implementation of secure processes.

Halcyon Knights

Halcyon Knights

Halcyon Knights is a specialist executive search and IT recruitment agency in the APAC region. Areas of specialisation include cybersecurity.

GlobalPlatform

GlobalPlatform

GlobalPlatform’s specifications are highly regarded as the international standard for enabling digital services and devices to be trusted and securely managed throughout their lifecycle.

Sergeant Laboratories

Sergeant Laboratories

Sergeant Laboratories builds advanced technologies to prove compliance in complex IT security and regulatory compliance situations.

TM One

TM One

TM One is the enterprise and public sector business solutions arm of Telekom Malaysia Berhad (TM) Group.

InfoLock

InfoLock

Infolock are experts in data governance, providing consulting and advisory services that help organizations effectively secure, manage, and optimize their data.

eXate

eXate

eXate provides pioneering technology that empowers organisations to protect, control and manage their sensitive data centrally, providing a complete data privacy solution.

CentricalCyber

CentricalCyber

CentricalCyber is a cyber risk consultancy and NIST CSF specialist set up to help business leaders better understand and manage cyber risk.

Tide Foundation

Tide Foundation

Tide's breakthrough multi-party-cryptography enables TRUE-zero-trust technology that unlocks cyber-herd immunity.

Jera IT

Jera IT

Jera IT provide fully managed IT support, cybersecurity services, telecoms systems, and IT strategy consultancy to businesses based in Aberdeen and the surrounding area.

Aquia

Aquia

Aquia are on a mission to enable innovation and drive transformative change to solve the world’s most pressing and complex cybersecurity challenges.