Craig Lusher from our Secure team takes a deep dive into the latest DDoS stats from the second quarter of the year
Overview of 2Q 2024
As was the case in the first quarter of 2024, Continent 8 continues to see a decline in DDoS attacks against its customers with just 32 incidents reported across customers in the second quarter of the year. This marks a 45% decrease from the 58 attacks recorded in the previous quarter and is a mere fraction of the 1,106 DDoS attacks successfully thwarted during the corresponding period in 2023.
The quarter’s fluctuation in the number of attacks per month, with 8 in April, 5 in May and 19 in June, indicates varying attack campaigns or possibly enhanced defensive strategies.
Attack size and intensity (Gbps)
The intensity of attacks in the second quarter of 2024 escalated significantly than in the previous quarter in terms of peak attack size:
- The highest attack recorded was 85.5 Gbps in June, a stark contrast to 1Q’s peak of 3 Gbps.
- The average attack size increased to 4.8 Gbps, significantly higher than 1Q’s recent company-record-low average of <1 Gbps.
- April saw a 45.8 Gbps attack, while May’s largest attack was <0.5 Gbps.
This quarter’s surge in peak attack intensity, particularly in June, indicates a concerning trend towards more powerful DDoS attempts, despite their decreased frequency.
Impact on customers
The highest number of attacks a single customer faced was 7, a significant reduction from the peak of 25 attacks in the first quarter. This data indicates a shift towards a more distributed pattern of attacks in the second quarter compared to the first quarter.
Duration and frequency
The timing and frequency of attacks in the second quarter of 2024 reveal some interesting trends:
- The total attack duration for 2Q was 25.7 hours, significantly lower than the 36.6 hours in 1Q.
- The longest single attack lasted 4.8 hours, more than double the longest attack in 1Q which was 2.1 hours.
- The average attack duration increased to 50 minutes, compared to 1Q’s average of 38 minutes.
These figures indicate that while there were fewer attacks overall, they tended to last longer on average, with some attacks being significantly more persistent than in the previous quarter. Prolonged attacks can strain resources for unprotected customers, potentially leading to substantial disruptions if critical systems or services are compromised by malicious activity.
2Q 2024 quarterly summary
The second quarter of 2024 witnessed a significant reduction in overall DDoS activity compared to the first quarter. However, there has been a concerning uptick in the intensity of attacks, particularly in June, posing a greater risk of potential damage. The fluctuations observed throughout the quarter, peaking with a spike in June, suggest evolving DDoS attack strategies. Employing an advanced DDoS mitigation system and solution is essential to safeguard against potential threats.
Continent 8’s DDoS mitigation solution
Our best-in-class DDoS solution continues to evolve and in recent months we have amplified our scrubbing capacity to 2.5+ Tbps, as well as increased our scrubbing centres geographically deployed across multiple continents. Locations include Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Miami, London, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Singapore, Hong Kong and Sao Paulo.
Key features of our mitigation solution:
DDoS protection should also form part of a wider, multi-layered approach to cybersecurity. A 360-degree, end-to-end protection strategy should include DDoS mitigation solution as well as WAF/WAAP protection, MDR/EDR services, SIEM and SOC resources, VAPT assessments, backup solutions, and mobile device and phishing defence services.
This is the only way to have multiple protections in place for each attack type and to ensure the greatest level of resilience.
To learn more about how Continent 8 can help protect your organisation, contact a member of the team via sales@continent8.com or our Contact Us form.
