Techniques for detecting, preventing and mitigating distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks

Abstract

Even though Internet appears to be one of the successful phenomena of globalization today, web applications, services, and servers are being challenged by multiple vulnerabilities due to multiple penetrations. These security flaws can easily be exploited by malicious actors who will use malware to launch DDoS to damage critical infrastructures in small and large businesses putting their productivity and trust at risk. This paper offers methods that public and private sectors can consider to lessen damages cause by DDoS. The detective techniques will help uncover some early signs of malicious activities in the organization’s network. The preventive ones will ensure all methods have been implemented to stop the intrusion from happening. Findings have demonstrated that mitigation mechanism can only be effective with detective and preventive methods. It is vital to keep in mind that attackers are busy developing sophisticated tools to disrupt services and damage systems making traditional security tools ineffective. They need to be replaced by robust security technologies to protect networked systems efficiently as presented in this research. Security awareness as an important network security practice, will educate non-IT professionals, serve as a reminder to IT professionals and result in thwarting insider threats. When all these are successfully implemented, an attacker’s chances of launching a successful distributed denial-of-service attack are reduced by 2%.