DNS attack types are getting more and more every year. Just as the Internet expands every day, unfortunately, online crime grows too. Motivations can be different. Extortion is on the top rank, but also boredom, people trying to prove their computing skills, the so-called hacktivism, or to take down a competitor.

In any case, different DNS attack types take advantage of the multiple Domain Name System (DNS) vulnerabilities. They have different ways to operate but all of them are dangerous for your business. Let’s get familiar with the most popular DNS attack types.

DNS attack – How to prevent it?

DNS Flood Attack

The objective of this type of DNS attack is to send as much traffic as possible to the victim (targeted server) to drown it. Here there are two choices. The traffic can be sent from a single source. This attack can be effective but still possible to stop or handle. But the attack can be enabled from different sources and that can mean millions of bots attacking a target. This will be much more challenging.

DNS Tunneling

In this type of attack, criminals create a tunnel exploiting the DNS protocol to infect with malware and avoid detection. They make this look like a DNS request.

This type of attack routes DNS requests to a malicious server for criminals to have a covert command, control channel, and an exfiltration path for data. They can access important data about the victim through the tunnel too. Firewalls usually don’t stop DNS requests or responses. Criminals know it and use it to enable this DNS attack type. DNS requests and responses include small amounts of data, so the extraction of data happens slowly but it’s possible.

Distributed Reflection Denial of Service or DRDoS

In this attack, the DNS answers, rather than the DNS requests, are sent to the targeted server to overwhelm it. Criminals send DNS requests but the IP of the source will be modified. Servers will answer and all the traffic will go to the victim (modified IP). This explains the reflection effect of its name.

Suggested article: What is a DDoS attack and how to stop it?

DNS Cache Poisoning

DNS resolvers have cache memory useful to store information related to domains for a limited time. They also keep a copy of the DNS records only during the time their TTL (time to live) defines. Criminals can modify the DNS records to redirect the traffic to a destination they want. Usually, they send users (traffic) to forged (faked) websites to request them to share sensitive data and compromise their security.

Conclusion

Yes, DNS attack types are scary and sadly popular. The best way to prevent them and get accurate protection is to know more about them. Don’t be the next victim! Shielding your servers with the technology of anti-DDoS attack plans is a must to be safe.

Such technology includes smart firewalls to filter dangerous or suspicious traffic. Load balancing, to distribute the traffic and prevent your servers from being overwhelmed. Constant monitoring and much more! Check with a reliable provider.