A radical group of “hackers” (read: script kiddies) previously warned that they were going to perform a massive Distributed Denial of Service attack on the popular online news Web site, CNN.com. After their warning became well received, they called it off, but followed it up with a veiled threat for the “future.”
DDoS’ing is so 1996.
A DDoS attack is simply utilizing several thousand computers and instructing them to send illegitimate traffic to an Internet destination. By doing this, the target becomes extremely slow and can result in being taken “offline” for many legitimate users.
Overview
Chinese computer enthusiasts (who claim they’re hackers), have threatened to attack CNN.com because they are unfairly covering Chinese news. They preempted an attack on CNN.com on Friday last week, resulting in severed access for much of the Asia continent. (CNet states “protest,” but that means boycotting traffic, not sending traffic, IMO)
Counter-Strike Defense
A majority of Web sites, especially ones that involve politics, news, religion and other controversial subjects have taken measures to secure themselves from these types of attacks. However, despite the barriers (like Mod_Security), networks are still inherently vulnerable because DDoS attacks can vary their methods making it difficulty to catch. For example, botnet owners could command half their network to do typical ICMP pings while the other half carries out a handful of Web Assaults.
Megabits, Not Megabombs.
I am glad that instead of setting off bombs and killing innocent bystanders, terrorists are taking it to Web. The only thing that can be lost in a DDoS attack is electrons. This is the new age of terrorism, since it places networks and their backbones at risk for limited connectivity. (CNN is on the AOL Transit Data Network, owned and operated by Time Warner. Duh.)
Arbor Networks Protected Scientology, They Can Protect CNN, n00bs.
After numerous targeted attacks from the group known as Anonymous against the Scientology Web site, Arbor Networks was able to mitigate those DDoS attacks. According to Web surfers, CNN is not worse than Scientology, so Arbor Networks earns some street cred’ for their service. “I’m in ur packets, droppin’ them.”
I don’t offer any empathy for these “hackers,” since they lack skills in diplomacy — the very thing they are waging Internet war for. And this is coming from China, where their own News is regulated by the government. Real credible. Please do something good, like stop sending spam. Kthxbye.
