DDoS Attack or Not? Yesterday’s Outage Left Many Systems Down for Hours

DDoS Attack or Not? Yesterday’s Outage Left Many Systems Down for Hours

Yesterday, an outage stemming from T-Mobile left many major systems down. Affected websites included T-Mobile itself, Instagram, Comcast, Sprint and Chase Bank. Was it a massive DDoS attack or just a server misconfiguration as they’re claiming?

First, it’s probably a good idea to explain what a DDoS attack or Distributed Denial-of-Service attack is and what it aims to do.

A DDoS attack is a cyber attack where the perpetrator or group of perpetrators seeks to make a server or network unavailable by attacking its connection to the internet. They typically do this by flooding the affected systems with traffic, overloading them and causing them to go down.

These attacks can happen to a single computer, an office, or even on a global scale. The website https://digitalattackmap.com/ attempts to track these DDoS attacks on a global level, however it’s somewhat controversial among cyber security experts as they question the veracity of it’s data.

Many time these outages are made apparent by the website https://downdetector.com/ which accurately tracked the cascading wave of websites that went down in yesterdays event.

Down Detector is a reliable source for tracking whether the connection issues you’re having are stemming from your network or the website or service you’re trying to access is truly down.

So, was yesterday’s event a DDoS attack or just an error? The public will probably never know. However as cyber crime continues to ramp up - purported to be a $6 trillion dollar industry by 2021 - it’s a good idea to have the best protections in place so you and your business don’t fall victim.

A DDoS attack aimed at your systems may expose other vulnerabilities, and the downtime alone can be costly. If your IT team isn’t adequately prepared to defend against this or any of the other varieties of cyber attacks plaguing the technology market, it might be time for a new team.

This article was powered by Valley TechLogic, an IT provider in Atwater, CA. You can find more information at https://www.valleytechlogic.com/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/valleytechlogic/ . Follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/valleytechlogic.

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