DDoS Frightfest

IBM's recently discovered an alarming fact: distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks are rapidly increasing. The company released a report that offers insight on the attacks and reasons to why they're being performed. According to the IBM Cyber Security Intelligence Index the average number of attacks on a single organization in a week is 1,400 attacks, with an average of 1.7 incidents per week.
DDoS Attacks? What Are Those?You might be wondering, what exactly is a DDoS attack? And what's the difference between attacks and incidents? IBM defines attacks as security events that correlation and analytic tools identify as malicious activity trying to collect, degrade, or destroy information system resources or the data itself. This includes URL tampering, denial of service, and spear phishing. Incidents, on the other hand, are attacks that human security analysts review and deem a problem worthy of deeper investigation.
Who's Targeted and WhyMalicious codes and sustained probes are the two most common attacks that make up for over 60 percent of incidents. A sustained scan is reconnaissance activity that's designed to gather information, like operating systems or open ports, about targeted systems. Malicious codes can be Trojan software, keyloggers, or droppers. It is software created to gain unauthorized access into systems and gather information.
The manufacturing industry is the number one targeted industry with 26.5 percent of DDoS attacks directed towards it. Almost 21 percent of attacks are directed at finance and insurance, and 18.7 percent at information and communication. Health and social services and retail and wholesale are targeted 7.3 and 6.6 percent of the time, respectively.
There are a handful of reasons perpetrators execute their invasions. Nearly half of all attacks are opportunistic, meaning that they takes advantage of existing vulnerabilities without any motivation other than to do damage. Twenty three percent are done because of industrial espionage, terrorism, financial crime, or data theft. Perpetrators discontented with their employers or job account for 15 percent of attacks, while only seven percent constitute attacks done in the name of social activism or civil disobedience.
How Do We Stop the Attacks?Humans are the number one cause of vulnerability in organizations. Forty-two percent of the breaches that happen are due to misconfigured systems or applications. End-use errors make up 31 percent of the breaches, while 6 percent is because of both vulnerable codes and targeted attacks. It's important to crack down on online security protocol with employees to prevent your business from falling victim to these attacks.
IBM offers two essential pieces of advice to help organizations prevent incidents: building a risk-aware culture and managing incidents and response. There should be no tolerance if colleagues are careless about security; it is the management's job to enforce stricter regulations on company security and to track company progress. It is crucial to implement company-wide intelligent analytics and automated response capabilities. Enterprises can easily monitor and respond to systems that are automated and unified.
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