Intelligent CIO Middle East Issue 94 | Page 76

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number of tracked DDoS weapons in the environment has nearly tripled in the past two years , and the 3.45 Tbps DDoS attack on Microsoft Azure in late 2021 showed the unprecedented scale hackers are now capable of achieving .
Of course , size is not everything ; even attacks under 500 Mbps that slip through datacentre security gaps can have a significant impact on service . In fact , these smaller exploits are proliferating fast , as botnets-for-hire make it easy for even unskilled hackers to wreak havoc . A single compromised server can open the door to a flood of malicious traffic in under half a minute .
Commercial datacentre operators are all too aware of the situation , reporting to A10 Networks that DDoS threats in their networks are growing more sophisticated , 64 %, more frequent , 48 %, and larger , 38 %. scale , to filter out malicious traffic without disrupting their customers ’ normal business operations .
DDoS mitigation solutions typically offer features and capabilities such as benchmarking , anomaly detection , IP reputation lists , connection and rate limits , and attack mitigation , but these essential DDoS defence tasks need to be performed thoroughly and frequently .
The A10 Networks-Gatepoint survey reported that datacentre operators missed attacks , saw slowed performance , decreased service availability , and in an alarming number of cases , an inability to adequately detect DDoS threats at all . Two in five are planning to reevaluate their DDoS defence solution in the near future .
Mitigation services
Even a single DDoS attack can have a serious impact , impairing or denying mission-critical services for an individual datacentre tenant or across the entire facility , and one in 10 survey respondents is suffering such incidents weekly or more . Lost business and customer attrition from a DDoS attack is a concern for two-thirds of providers , and rightly so .
While datacentre security and DDoS defence capabilities such as fast detection and response can limit the damage from a DDoS attack , time is of the essence . Datacentre and colocation providers need to be able to distinguish a sudden flood of fraudulent requests from legitimate usage in real time , at massive
Value-added services are a core element of the commercial datacentre business , with a large majority of survey respondents going beyond space , power , and cooling to offer managed network services , professional IT consulting services , and remote management and troubleshooting . Given the tenant mix of the typical commercial data centre , often dominated by financial services , retail , and government customers , datacentre security services are also an extremely popular offering .
DDoS mitigation is particularly well suited to this model . From the tenant ’ s perspective , a DDoS mitigation service makes it possible for even small businesses to tap into high-end features such as
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