Linode is suffering on-going DDoS attacks
I used to run a hosting company similar to Linode back in the day, and DDOS&#x27;s were the most annoying thing ever.<p>The main reason DDOS attacks exist is poor security and lack of cooperation between ISPs. Lack of adequate security on desktops (usually Windows) makes it possible to build large bot networks.<p>Lack of cooperation between ISPs makes it very hard to track down the source of the DOS. Very often the DDOS isn&#x27;t as distributed as it may seem - it can just be a couple of machines on a very well connected network (e.g. a university). But getting a hold of someone in the middle to filter that traffic can take a very long time or be outright impossible. First-responder network engineers (typically referred to as &quot;security&quot;) are overworked and underqualified, and the people who really know their stuff typically can&#x27;t be bothered with silly DOS attacks.<p>We&#x27;ve also observed that (D)DOS&#x27;s happen because of content. Anything political, religious, or whatever other shade of the many things someone out there disapproves of is a potential target for a DOS. Contrary to what you may read in the press, extortion is only a small minority of all DOS attacks out there. We&#x27;ve actually told customers to go away because their content was too DOS-prone.<p>And because these things usually happen across countries, even though they are very real crimes that cause serious damage and cost money, they are hardly ever prosecuted. As the target of a DOS all you want is for it to stop, nobody ever bothers reporting it to the authorities afterwards (because how would you even know who the &quot;authority&quot; is).