DDOS attacks decreased by 25% in Q4 2017: Verisign report

The most intense DDOS attack was a multi-vector attack which sent a flood of traffic to the targeted network for around an hour.

The average DDOS peak attack size was 7.6 Gbps during Q4 2017. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

There was a 25% decrease in the Distribution Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks in the fourth quarter of 2017 as compared to the third quarter, a new report said on Tuesday.

Verisign, a global leader in domain names and internet security, found that the largest volumetric and highest intensity DDoS attack observed by Verisign in the fourth quarter of 2017 was a multi-vector attack that peaked at approximately 53 Gbps and over 5 Mpps.

This attack sent a flood of traffic to the targeted network for about an hour, the company said in a statement.

A DDoS is a type of Denial of Service (DoS) attack where multiple compromised systems, which are often infected with a Trojan, are used to target a single system.

The average peak attack size was 7.6 Gbps, which is 850% increase compared to the third quarter but it is a 32% year-over-year decrease as compared to the fourth quarter 2016. Nearly, 40% of the total attacks were over 5Gbps, the report said.

Verisign also observed that 25% of customers who experienced DDoS attacks in the fourth quarter 2017 were targeted multiple times during the quarter. 82% of DDoS attacks mitigated by Verisign in the fourth quarter employed multiple attack types. Verisign observed attacks targeting networks at multiple layers and attack types that changed over the course of a DDoS event.