The hacktivists, who seek political attention with their actions, have become quieter. The third quarter of 2022 was again dominated by intelligent DDoS attacks. Germany is one of the most attacked countries.
The number of DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks increased steadily in the third quarter of 2022, as a recent analysis by Kaspersky shows. Attacks carried out by professionals in particular increased: so-called intelligent attacks even doubled compared to the previous year. However, the number of hacktivist attacks, which had increased in the first two quarters of this year, decreased significantly.
DDoS can massively disrupt processes
Cyber criminals use DDoS attacks to disrupt the operation of a website or to completely paralyze it. Attacks typically target government entities, retail or financial companies, media, or other organizations. The affected companies can lose customers and their reputations can be damaged.
In the third quarter of 2022, the number of DDoS attacks increased again compared to the previous quarter - as is usual after the summer quarter. Compared to the same period last year, the total number of DDoS attacks increased by 47,87 percent, while the number of intelligent, complex and professionally executed attacks even doubled.
Geography of DDoS attacks
In the third quarter of 2022, the four countries with the most attacked resources remained unchanged compared to the previous one. Resources in the United States (39,60 percent) were attacked most frequently, followed by China (13,98 percent), Germany (5,07 percent) and France (4,81 percent).
The situation is similar with the distribution of the botnet servers. They are predominantly located in the USA (43,10 percent), the Netherlands (9,34 percent), Germany (10,19 percent) and Russia (5,94 percent).
Hacktivists retreat
In general, Kaspersky experts identified a decrease in non-professional attacks in the third quarter. Although hacktivists were still very active in the first half of 2022, they shifted their resources to other malicious activities in QXNUMX. In the third quarter, the number of DDoS attacks by hacktivists tended towards zero.
On the other hand, the number of complex, professional attacks remained at a consistently high level after a significant increase in the first quarter. The targets of cybercriminals - mostly the financial and government sectors - have not changed either. On average, the attacks lasted around eight hours, with the longest attack lasting almost four days.
Attack duration of 8 hours
"Since the end of February, we have observed and blocked an unusually high number of amateur activist attacks," comments Alexander Gutnikov, security researcher at Kaspersky. “However, the number of these attacks has steadily decreased and returned to a normal level at the end of the third quarter. During the past quarter, we identified many sophisticated attacks that had well-defined goals, such as silencing media or even shutting down general government organizations.”
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