Spammers DDoS Blue Security

DNS Attack Hurts TypePad and LiveJournal

May 2, 2006 - Blue Security, a software maker that attempted to keep spammers under control, was the focal point of a huge Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack. Blue Security had been developing a new community-based anti-spam tool called Blue Frog. The software was a vigilante-style unsubscribe request generator that, in many ways, was a DDoS-attack weapon against the spam operators.

In retaliation, spammers directed their attack at the Blue Security's website. DNS settings for the Blue Security site were redirected from www.bluesecurity.com to the company's TypePad blog. This meant that while the attack was targeted at Blue Security, Six Apart was taking the damage. Many services hosted by Six Apart, including LiveJournal, were knocked right off the net.

The spammers apparently used a botnet, a large collection of zombied computers and servers to send millions of inundating requests to Blue Security. All these requests looked legitimate, so security measures were mostly useless.

The team at Six Apart tried to stop the attack by using several methods. They were unable to do so and, at 8:00 p.m., all of the websites hosted by Six Apart, including Blue Security, went down. As many as 10 million online communities and blogs were affected by the attack.

Source: Q Daily News

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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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