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DoS Attack Knocks Out Microsoft SitesHackers geared DoS attack to target DNS switchJanuary 25, 2001 - Microsoft's Web site was brought down by a powerful Denial of Service (DoS) attack. The DoS attack began in the morning and extended through the afternoon, making the company's Web page intermittently unavailable to customers. Due to the magnitude and security issues, the FBI was brought in to take care of the case. In the past, DoS attacks did not have enough power to take down the Domain Name Service (DNS) servers of a huge company such as Microsoft. During some periods of the DoS attack, Microsoft's Web page could be loaded only 2 percent of the time. Normally, a Web page could be loaded 97 percent of the time. For about two hours, the Web site was completely blocked. The DoS attack flooded Microsoft's DNS servers with huge amounts of data. Because of this DNS flood, legitimate users could no longer load the company's Web pages causing significant losses. At the time of the attack, Microsoft's Web site was the third most visited on the Internet, receiving 54 million unique visitors in a month. Apparently, the attackers used a flaw in Microsoft's defenses. The Redmond-based company connected its most important DNS servers to a single switch. The attackers targeted this exact DNS switch and managed to deliver a deadly strike. "In this case, the attack was aimed not at the servers, but at the hardware switches that route data to the Web sites," stated a Microsoft representative. The company completely recovered from the DoS attack by late afternoon of the same day. Source: ZDNet.co.uk About Secure64 Software Corporation
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