Category Archives: Denial-of-service attack

Cloud & IT Management, Cyberoam, Denial-of-service attack, Guest Post, High Tech Security, Network security, Unified threat management

CyberOam Provides Critical Insight for Virtual Datacenter Administrators

Guest Post by Natalie Lehrer, a senior contributor for CloudWedge.

Organizations must provide reliable technical resources in order to keep a business running in an efficient manner. Network security is one of the chief concerns of all companies regardless of size. Although corporations are often pressed to earn profits, the need to protect all company related data at any cost should be a top priority.

Virtual datacenters can be susceptible to a variety of threats including hyperjacking, DoS attacks and more. The importance of keeping up to date on the latest server patches, security bulletins and being aware of the latest malware threats is more important than ever. Therefore, it is critical that all incoming network traffic is properly scanned in search of viruses and malicious code that could possibly corrupt or cause the malfunction of the virtual datacenter.

What is the Solution?

Network appliances such as Cyberoam can act as a unified threat management suite. In addition, Cyberoam scans as all incoming and outgoing traffic while producing detailed reports for system administrators. These granular reports list all virtual datacenter activity while providing logs that give forensic computer scientists direction on where to focus their investigations. Since any activities performed on virtual servers can be retained using Cyberoam, the audit process can provide a clear trail which will lead you to the culprit incase of a data breach. Cyberoam is not a reactive solution. Cyberoam proactively scans all incoming and outgoing data incase viruses and other harmful programs try to compromise and corrupt your entire virtual datacenter.

Security intricacies include intrusion protection services, specialized auditing applications and robust firewall features. Firewalls play an important role in keeping all harmful material from compromising virtual servers. Firewalls essentially block intruders while simultaneously allowing legitimate TCP or UDP packets to enter your system. Cyberoam allows administrators the ability to easily construct firewall rules that keep internal data safe and secure.

When you setup your virtual datacenter, it is important to utilize all of the features at your disposal. Sometimes the most obscure features are the most valuable. The best way to keep your virtual datacenter is safe is be on top of the latest knowledge. There have been reports that many IT professionals find themselves intimidated by new technology simply have not taken the initiative to learn all about the latest datacenter hardware and software available to them today. If you are trying to stay one step ahead of the game, your best bet is to learn all about the tools on the market and make your decision accordingly. Be sure to scrutinize any appliance you decide to utilize inside of your datacenter before adding it into your arsenal of IT weaponry.

Headshot

Natalie Lehrer is a senior contributor for CloudWedge.

In her spare time, Natalie enjoys exploring all things cloud and is a music enthusiast.

Follow Natalie’s daily posts on Twitter: @Cloudwedge, or on Facebook.

Denial-of-service attack, GitHub, Outage Alert

Breaking: GitHub Back Up After Today’s DDoS Attack

GitHub was essentially down for about an hour today, starting at around 11 am Eastern (1500 UTC) due to a reported DDoS attack. From their status page:

15:05 UTC We’re currently experiencing a large DDoS attack. The site is experiencing major packet loss and is mostly unavailable. We’re working to further mitigate the attack.

16:10 UTC We’ve mitigated the DDoS attack and the site should responding normally. We’re still investigating the cause of the small increase in exceptions when accessing the GitHub API.

Denial-of-service attack, Domain Name System, Network Solutions, Opinion, Outage Alert

Hey Network Solutions, New Rule: Use Social During an Outage

Network Solutions is in trouble today. Rumor has it DNS issues are the root cause, but it’s unclear. What is clear is if your site is hosted by NetSol it is unreachable.

If you dig really hard you can get links to their blog which might offer more detail. But… it’s unreachable (duh).

I picture NetSol personnel happily posting critical updates to a blog only they can reach.

New Rule: If your servers/dns/routers/network is experiencing problems, use your Twitter and Facebook accounts to communicate with customers. Don’t want your dirty laundry messing up your marketing? Set up Twitter/FB Support accounts.

Application programming interface, Cloud Security Alliance, Data loss, Denial-of-service attack, Notorious Nine, Opinion, Research

Do You Know the Top Threats to Cloud Security?

Where computing goes, trouble follows — in the form of hackers, disgruntled employees, and plain old destructive bugs. And as computing is moving to the Cloud (it says so right there in our logo!) that’s where some of the newest threats are emerging.

The Cloud Security Alliance has identified The Notorious Nine, (registration required) the top nine cloud computing threats for 2013.

Data breaches, data loss, account and traffic hijacking, insecure interfaces and APIs, denial of service attacks, malicious insiders, cloud “abuse” (using the power of the cloud to crack passwords), lack of due diligence, and shared technology platforms leading to shared vulnerabilities.