Cyber criminals are exploring new ways of conducting distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks to make them harder to protect against and more effective at causing disruption.

DDoS attacks are a relatively simple, but potent, form of cyberattack in which cyber criminals overload services with web traffic, slowing them down or taking them offline entirely, preventing others from being able to use them. The attacks can range from short campaigns that last a few minutes to attacks strung out over extended periods of time.

These attacks often rely on malware-infected computers, servers and Internet of Things devices being connected into a botnet, which then overwhelms the target of the DDoS with web traffic.

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While DDoS attacks are unsophisticated compared to other malicious cyber campaigns, they can cause significant disruption. Large DDoS campaigns have temporarily severely disrupted online services, businesses and even the online infrastructures of entire countries.

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The criminals behind DDoS attacks