DDoS attack on vaccination portal

At the end of December, vaccination against the COVID-19 virus began in the European Union; it has now become known that a cyberattack on the vaccination portal of the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians in Thuringia and the Thuringian Ministry of Health had already occurred in December. This was probably a so-called DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack. As the vaccination center announced, the servers were overloaded by a high number of requests and collapsed as a result. Booking vaccination appointments via the site was therefore initially not possible.

What is a DDoS attack?

This form of cyberattack is an attempt to paralyze a server, a website, or even just parts of a website. For this purpose, countless (and pointless) requests are sent to the respective server within a very short time. How many requests are necessary depends on the server’s capacity. In Thuringia, about 158,000 requests were necessary.

The requests are usually sent by a mixture of botnets and reflectors. Botnets are infected devices that can be directly controlled by the hacker by means of malware. These “zombie” computers then send misleading connection requests to other computers, which are then called reflectors. These reflectors do not necessarily have to be infected themselves. Because here, hackers exploit the characteristics of our modern devices to also want to “answer” queries. In this way, they manage to build up a comparatively small botnet and also cover their tracks, since devices that are not involved in themselves now also support the attack.

Who is the target of DDoS attacks?

The good news, if you will, upfront: the target of such attacks is not private individuals. Such attacks usually target large websites and opinion leaders – but also, as the current case shows, the healthcare sector, governments, or banks. In other words, important and critical infrastructure. This is why some security experts classify DDoS attacks in the realm of digital warfare, as they can paralyze critical civilian networks and thus harm society.

It is important to note, however, that a DDoS attack does not primarily have monetary goals. It is often about protesting against a site that does not correspond to one’s own political opinion. Or even just to prove that one has the skills to carry out such hacks. These attacks become really critical when the primary goal is not to cripple the site, but other actions are running in the background. The superficial distraction facilitates the cover-up of a more serious hack in the background. If critical infrastructures are affected, a ransom demand can also follow in order to release the server as quickly as possible and get it up and running again.

For the current case, however, the background of the act is not further known.

How can you protect yourself from a DDoS attack?

Since you as a private individual are not the primary target of such an attack, the sobering answer here is: very little to nothing. However, your primary goal should always be to protect your PC as best as possible against malware being installed. After all, this is how you can at least prevent yourself from becoming part of the botnet. Therefore, always update your virus software on the devices you use in a timely manner. The router also plays an important role in protecting your network and should therefore always be up to date. The same applies to your passwords. Wherever possible, set up modern password protection with multifactor authentication. A password manager can help you keep track of your passwords.

As a web administrator, you basically have options available to defend against such attacks. For example, if you notice an unusual data stream in time, you can redirect it to a “black hole” (= a non-existent server). A bandwidth management tool as well as good virus software will help you in advance to fend off simple DDoS attacks if necessary. The last option is to rent a higher bandwidth to ensure availability despite high traffic. For your users, unfortunately, the only option is to wait until your service is available again.