Dos and DDoS attacks are very popular among cybercriminals. They are fundamentally different, but both are aimed at flooding a server with traffic, making a website or any other web software temporarily unavailable. Let's understand the nature and dangers of these attacks.
What is a DoS Attack?
By its nature, a DoS attack is a denial-of-service attack. It consists of flooding the server with traffic, which leads to a temporary suspension of the service.
What is a DDoS Attack?
A DDoS attack is similar to a DoS attack in that their main type of impact is to overload a server to temporarily stop services. However, unlike a DoS attack, this type of attack utilizes several computing systems at once, which increases the damage.
Broad Types of DoS and DDoS Attacks
Nowadays, Dos and DDoS attacks are divided into many types, each of which is used for specific results. Among them there are manipulations and attempts to slow down or destroy the business of small and medium-sized companies. Some use such attacks to damage a competitor or to cause costly problems. Let's take a look at the most common types of these attacks.
Teardrop Attack
A type of DoS attack that involves sending countless fragments of IP information to the network. After receiving these fragments into files, the network encounters an error because the task is impossible.
Flooding Attack
Another type of DoS attack that involves sending a certain number of requests to join a server. However, after receiving a positive response, the request is not answered. This manipulation is performed many times, after which sooner or later the server is overloaded with pending requests, making it temporarily impossible for normal users to connect.
IP Fragmentation Attack
A type of DoS attack that involves delivering edited network packets that cannot be reassembled by the receiving network. As a result, the network is overloaded with uncollected packets, wasting all available computing resources.
Volumetric Attack
A type of DDoS attack that is used to focus on bandwidth resources. In this way, a hacker can use a botnet to redirect a large number of request packets into a network, resulting in bandwidth congestion.
Protocol Attack
A unique type of DDoS attack that targets flaws at layers 3 and 4 of the OSI model. Such requests result in the rapid consumption of network resources until the network is completely shut down.
Application-based Attack
A DDoS attack that targets layer 7 of the OSI model. Among all types of attacks, it is the application-based attack that is considered the most difficult to detect because it does not use sending corrupted packets, but only partial packets with little or no bandwidth consumption.
Most Common Forms of DDoS Attacks
Among the most popular types of DDoS attacks are the following:
- HTTP flooding;
- SYN flood;
- UDP flooding.
DoS vs DDoS: What’s the Difference?
The main difference between a DDoS and a DoS attack is the number of systems used to overwhelm the network. While DoS utilizes multiple sources at the same moment, DDoS resorts to the use of thousands and sometimes even hundreds of thousands of unwitting systems. Devices called botnets are used for this purpose.
Why do DoS and DDoS Attacks Occur?
In many cases, services that depend on online availability fall under such attacks. These include bookmakers, online stores, and so on. Attackers can suspend their work for a certain period, resulting in significant losses and potentially leading to the collapse of the business. The goals of DDoS and DoS attacks may differ, but most often they are aimed at weakening competitors.
How to Prevent DoS and DDoS attacks
Nowadays, there is simply no 100% way to protect against DDoS and DoS attacks. Web server owners can only resort to all known security measures, which will only slightly reduce the risk of attack. Read on and learn about the best DDoS and DoS support software.
How to Improve DoS and DDoS Attack Protection?
It should be understood that DDoS and DoS attacks are always individual, both in approach and in nature. Therefore, it is simply impossible to find an optimal solution to block them. However, there are a number of comprehensive measures that can reduce and weed out weak and medium attacks. This is accomplished by using defense in depth, solid principles, and a proactive approach.
What are the Best Tools for DoS and DDoS Attack Protection?
The list of the best technologies to protect a resource from cyberattacks includes:
- Filtering incoming web traffic and inspecting it;
- Reducing and setting the initial traffic level;
- Timely recognition of DDoS attacks and prompt blocking of incoming traffic;
- Providing a dashboard for traffic control purposes.
There are some commonly used softwares that will significantly strengthen the protection of your web service: FortiDDoS, BlockDoS, BitNinja and Data Dome.
Is DDoS More Dangerous than DoS?
DDoS attacks are certainly more damaging than DoS attacks. The danger lies in the fact that during a DDoS attack, requests come from thousands of systems at the same moment. This makes it much harder to find the source of the attack.
Conclusion
DDoS and DoS attacks are as much of an issue in 2023 as they were when they first appeared. However, in the past, service owners did not have access to useful information and supporting software. Nowadays, this problem has been solved and businesses have the opportunity to minimize the number of cyberattacks.
