RapidSatellite.com Attacked by Aggressive Competitor

DNS Services Targeted

On 6th October 2004, RapidSatellite.com was hit by a devastating Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack. RapidSatellite.com was selling satellite TV receivers. The targeted company responded quickly and moved its online store to Speedera.

For three days the situation was normal, but on the third day, another attack crippled Speedera's Domain Name Service (DNS) servers. For one hour, this strong attack took out some of Speedera's other clients, including Amazon.com and the U.S. Department of Homeland security. After this second attack, RapidSatellite.com moved to Akamai, but within a week the cyber criminals managed to stall the Akamai service using a HTTP flood attack.

The attack on RapidSatellite.com was managed by Paul Ashley, 30, of Ohio. Ashley was paid by Jay Echouafni, 37, CEO of the online satellite TV retailer Orbit Communication Corporation. The attack was carried out in order to disable Orbit's competition.

Jay Echouafni was arrested in Massachusetts and after paying $750,000 bail, managed to get out of the country. This case was the first case in which a corporate executive used the services of cyber criminals to strike at the competition.

Source: The Register

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Secure64® is a software developer providing highly secure DNS and server applications with built-in denial-of-service protection features to help ensure your Internet-dependent business is always accessible. Based on the genuinely secure SourceT® microOS, Secure64 DNS remains highly available during network attacks and is immune to compromise from rootkits and malware.

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