Russia becomes main target for DDoS attacks
There has been a huge increase in the number of DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks in the second quarter of this year, a new research report by security experts Nexusguard says.
According to Nexusguard’s Q2 2016 Threat Report, there has been more than 182,900 attacks in Q2 this year, with the majority falling onto Russia.
Yes, Russa has become the number one target country for DDoS attacks, with its Starlink internet provider soaking up more than 40 percent of the DDoS attacks measured over a two-day period. The average length of such attacks has gone from minutes to hours. It seems that hacktivists are targeting Russian businesses.
"We were surprised to see an increase in DDoS attacks this quarter, especially as hackers experiment with ransomware, phishing schemes and other data-grabbing methods for monetary gain", says Terrence Gareau, chief scientist at Nexusguard. "Organizations can expect cyberattacks to continue growing in frequency this year, especially with more attention on the Summer Olympics and the November election season in the US. The results from this quarter also show how important it is to not only protect your website, but also to plan for new payloads and attacks on your infrastructure".
Besides Russia, the US and China remain the top three targets, with Brazil also staying in the top ten. However, attacks in the South American country have diminished, cut in half.
The future doesn’t look brighter, either. The report says hackers are experimenting with new attack methodologies, and with the upcoming Olympic games in the country, as well as political tensions around the world, Nexusguard expects Q3 to be just as bad.
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