A DoS attack overwhelms a computer system, typically a server or web page host, to make it unavailable for legitimate users. It can take different forms, such as flooding or crashing the server, and can be intentional or unintentional.
A DoS attack is a form of malicious action typically taken against a computer system such as a server or web page host. This type of attack can also be used against smaller systems such as a computer’s central processing unit (CPU), although this is quite unusual. The attack aims to make the server unavailable for use by legitimate users. A DoS attack can take a number of different forms, although in general it is intended to overwhelm a system by flooding or crashing the system.
The target of a DoS attack, which stands for “denial of service” and shouldn’t be confused with a disk operating system or DOS, is usually a main server hosting a website or similar service. “Denial of service” means that the system is attacked in some way which ultimately causes the system to become unresponsive to legitimate customers or users of the service. Service is then denied to people who try to browse the website or access a server that has been targeted.
A DoS attack can take a number of different forms, although it is usually intended to achieve one of two end results: flooding the server or crashing the server. Flooding occurs by causing a server to try to respond to too many users at once, often by using a program to “spoof” multiple non-existent users, which uses up system resources and causes it to become unresponsive. Server crashes are usually achieved through malicious software that uses a flaw or weakness in server programming to crash the server and make it inaccessible until restarted.
One reason a DoS attack can be so disruptive is because this type of attack can be relatively easy to launch and can continue for days or weeks. A DoS attack can also be launched as a more “permanent” attack that seeks to bring down a server in the long run. This is usually done by gaining access to the firmware in a server and “flashing” the server with new corrupt or malicious firmware, halting the server until the system is fixed or replaced.
A DoS attack can also be unintentional and still achieve similar results. When a web page or server is overwhelmed with legitimate user requests, such as when a popular website links to a smaller page on a server that can’t handle the user capacity of the larger server, the server can flood or crash. While this isn’t necessarily an “attack,” it’s often seen as just as disruptive, and can be an unfortunate consequence of a small website suddenly becoming popular.
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