At Cogeco Peer 1, we host over 8,000 customers, of whom 600 are e-commerce businesses. We fight distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks day in, day out. They became even uglier in and so this paper sets out what we have been seeing. It also gives the reader some hints on how to protect against this growing menace at a time when no sector or size of business is immune. This paper is written for business owners and decision-makers who are looking to understand the business impact and needs in the rising DDoS threat landscape. It will introduce you to DDoS attacks, go through the different types; explain the impact they have on enterprises, and outline some of the best practices when faced with this particular security threat. The fact that DDoS attacks do not discriminate – making any business in any industry a potential target, makes them a particularly worrying attack vector. Furthermore, the relative ease with which they can be sourced (as a service), and at extremely low cost, means they are no longer just the chosen method used by state-sponsored hackers to cause chaos and disruption. They are ever more commonly utilized by individuals and small groups with an axe to grind or a point to make.
