A Place of Safety: General Talk

Show: Today's Messages :: Show Polls :: Message Navigator

DDOS attack [message #73769]

Tue, 19 December 2017 08:49

timmy

Has no life at all

Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13671

We have been under attack for a while. This accounts for unusual site performance. We have put defences into place and have mitigated some of the effect. We are just caught up in the attack which is to a general IP range we happen to live n

[Updated on: Tue, 19 December 2017 09:00]

Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School

Re: DDOS attack [message #73770 is a reply to message #73769]

Tue, 19 December 2017 21:29

timmy

Has no life at all

Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13671

The way these things work makes them hard to defend against. Incoming attack traffic comes thick and fast from a varied and fast changing set fo IP addresses, often never the same one twice.

We have put unspecified defence measures in place once the attack touches the server, but we can do nothing about actually being bombarded. Even when defended against the touch of the attack against the defense causes horsepower issues at that point

Broadly speaking an attack such as this is triggered and propagates through the botnet of affected computers whcih are instructed to go onto the attack. If that machine is not online it attacks when it comes online next. It may pass its payload to other machines at this point, too. They then attack and pass on their payload.

So an attack starts out slow, ramps up to a peak, but is slow to tail off. These attacks cannot be stopped evenb if you 'turn the internet off' because they restart as soon as the switch is turned back on.

We believe we are in the tailing off phase right now, but there may be aftershocks, just like an earthquake. Our server is still under pressure, and it is still defending tself like a Ninja

Why us?

Probably just coincidence, unless the God Hates Fags lot finally got tech savvy, but all LGBT sites would be suffereng too. We are almost 100% certain that we are in a random IP address area and have been caught up as collateral damage.

Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School

Re: DDOS attack [message #73771 is a reply to message #73770]

Wed, 20 December 2017 04:10

Bisexual_Guy

Likes it here

Location: USA Midwest
Registered: September 2015
Messages: 147

At least two other of the gay story sites I frequent regularly were also unusually slow, plus a couple of non-story websites I frequent. This one often would time out, and the others sometimes time out. So you weren't the proverbial "lone ranger."

At least one was a web portal of general interest you would recognize, were I to name it.

Re: DDOS attack [message #73772 is a reply to message #73769]

Wed, 20 December 2017 22:19

timmy

Has no life at all

Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13671

Having been down for some hours earlier today we are, currently, back online.

Those unable to see this message will not appreciate any irony in it

Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School

Previous Topic:	This is being shown as an example of that which it is not
Next Topic:	Gay Seniors Give Advice

Goto Forum:

[ Syndicate this forum (XML) ] [

]

We support Ukraine — Мы поддерживаем Украину — Ми підтримуємо Україну

We support Ukraine — Мы поддерживаем Украину — Ми підтримуємо Україну