CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Oct. 15, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Akamai
Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: AKAM), the leading provider of cloud
services for delivering, optimizing and securing online content and
business applications, today released, through the company's
Prolexic Security Engineering & Response Team (PLXsert), a new
cybersecurity threat advisory. The advisory alerts the security
community, device vendors, Internet service providers and
enterprises to the risk of massive distributed denial of service
(DDoS) attacks involving Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) devices.
The advisory is available for download from Prolexic (now part of
Akamai) at www.prolexic.com/ssdp.
PLXsert has observed the use of a new reflection and
amplification DDoS attack that deliberately misuses communications
protocols that come enabled on millions of home and office devices,
including routers, media servers, web cams, smart TVs and printers.
The protocols allow devices to discover each other on a network,
establish communication and coordinate activities. DDoS attackers
have been abusing these protocols on Internet-exposed devices to
launch attacks that generate floods of traffic and cause website
and network outages at enterprise targets.
"Malicious actors are using this new attack vector to perform
large-scale DDoS attacks. PLXsert began seeing attacks from UPnP
devices in July, and they have become common," said Stuart Scholly, senior vice president and
general manager, Security Business Unit, Akamai. "The number of
UPnP devices that will behave as open reflectors is vast, and many
of them are home-based Internet-enabled devices that are difficult
to patch. Action from firmware, application and hardware vendors
must occur in order to mitigate and manage this threat."
PLXsert found 4.1 million Internet-facing UPnP devices are
potentially vulnerable to being employed in this type of reflection
DDoS attack – about 38 percent of the 11 million devices in use
around the world. PLXsert will share the list of potentially
exploitable devices to members of the security community in an
effort to collaborate with cleanup and mitigation efforts of this
threat.
"These attacks are an example of how fluid and dynamic the DDoS
crime ecosystem can be," explained Scholly. "Malicious actors
identify, develop and incorporate new resources and attack vectors
into their arsenals. It's predictable that they will develop,
refine and monetize these UPnP attack payloads and tools in the
near future."
Get the SSDP Reflection Threat Advisory to learn more
PLXsert replicated an attack of this type in a lab environment,
demonstrating how attackers produce reflection and amplification
DDoS attacks using UPnP-enabled devices. In the advisory, PLXsert
shares its analysis and details, including:
- How the SSDP protocol and SOAP requests are used in reflection
attacks
- Two example DDoS tools used to scan for vulnerable devices and
launch attacks
- Details of an observed attack campaign
- Geographical distribution of UPnP devices involved in
attacks
- Top 10 most common headers in UPnP response payloads
- Recommended system hardening and community action
- DDoS mitigation
A complimentary copy of the threat advisory is available for
download at www.prolexic.com/ssdp.
About Akamai
Akamai® is the leading provider of cloud services for
delivering, optimizing and securing online content and business
applications. At the core of the Company's solutions is the Akamai
Intelligent Platform™ providing extensive reach, coupled with
unmatched reliability, security, visibility and expertise. Akamai
removes the complexities of connecting the increasingly mobile
world, supporting 24/7 consumer demand, and enabling enterprises to
securely leverage the cloud. To learn more about how Akamai is
accelerating the pace of innovation in a hyperconnected world,
please visit www.akamai.com or blogs.akamai.com, and follow @Akamai
on Twitter.
Contacts:
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Rob Morton
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Tom Barth
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Media
Relations
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Investor
Relations
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617-444-3641
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617-274-7130
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rmorton@akamai.com
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tbarth@akamai.com
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SOURCE Akamai Technologies, Inc.