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What Do DDoS Mitigation Providers Offer?
In 1996, one of the oldest ISPs in the world fell victim to a flooding attack, which brought down its services for days while vendors attempted to find a way to stop the flow of useless requests to the network. Although this attack was thought to be the first of its kind, over the years, such denial of service (DoS) attacks have become popular with aggressors. Unfortunately, the early 2000s ushered in a new era of DoS attacks that were even more difficult to combat, necessitating DDoS protection for hosting providers.
What Is a DDoS Attack?
This new DoS attack, now known as a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack, is characterized by the use of multiple sources of incoming traffic. While both attacks flood a network with superfluous requests in an attempt to overwhelm systems and halt all legitimate claims, DDoS attacks use multiple origins to source the requests. As a result, it is impossible to stop the attack by blocking a single source. Instead, the source identifies the weakness in the system, works to identify others, and then turns them into bots to attack itself.
How Can DDoS Mitigation Help?
DDoS mitigation aims to prevent DDoS attacks by implementing layers of server protection. DDoS providers offer a combination of services, including equipment that is specially designed to ward off attacks and web hosting for protection. Although each DDoS provider has built unique protocols for defense, the process typically includes these steps:
- Detect an attack. First, the DDoS provider must distinguish a flood attack from normal traffic on a website. In particular, it is important that a normal influx of requests – such as those on a product release date – stay constant. Most DDoS providers utilize past data, known patterns of attack, and the reputation of IP servers to determine when to proceed.
- Respond to legitimate threats. Once the DDoS provider identifies a threat, the hosted network rejects the identified bot-produced traffic and continues to support regular traffic. Mitigation proceeds by using Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules for application-layer attacks as well as other filtration methods to weed out lower-level attacks.
- Support legitimate traffic. DDoS providers prevent denial of service to legitimate requests by rerouting traffic intelligently. This traffic is divided into manageable pieces, so any remaining bot traffic will not result in a flood.
- Adapt to future attacks. After an attack, DDoS mitigation helps a network learn and analyze patterns. Requests from certain countries, flagged IPs, and improper protocols become part of an overarching warning system, which the network will use to guard against future attacks.
How Can You Choose the Right Protection?
No matter your network configuration, your business is at risk for DDoS attacks, and you’ll want a protection solution to fit your needs. In particular, you’ll want services that are:
- Scalable, to fit the trending attacks and the size of your network.
- Adaptable, for continuous protection against new threats.
- Reliable, to provide 24/7 protection and on-call user support in the event of an attack.
LayerHost offers services for every level of need, ranging from comprehensive, bare-metal servers with 4TBPS protection, to a virtual private server with 10GBPS of mitigation. Better yet, our 24/7 monitoring and emergency support offer the security you need even when you’re under attack. For more information about choosing your optimal protection, contact LayerHost, or call 1-833-247-HOST.
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