MOSCOW, December 5 (Itar-Tass) —— The DDos attacks against information sites on the day of elections to the State Duma featured up to 200,000 infected computers, Yandex’ specialist in information security Vladimir Ivanov told audience of the Ekho Moskvy /Echo of Moscow/ radio station, which site was unavailable for users during the entire day of December 4 due to the attack.
“All attacks of the kind are coordinated from one centre: many computers managed by one operator make certain actions towards the site,” he explained. The expert did not rule out that one of the reasons the sites ‘failed’ was that users’ activity on the day of the elections was very high. “No doubt, the number of users on that day grew, but it is not probable that the growth was so big that it could cause such consequences.”
Organisation of such an attack might have cost several thousand dollars, he said, which is not expensive. It is possible, though quite complicated, to figure out the organiser, he said. “It is possible to find during an attack one of participating computers and to find out, from where he is receiving instructions,” Ivanov explained. “After that, it would be necessary to find out who managers that server.” In order to avoid such failures, Ivanov suggested using software to make a site more resistible to high demand.
According to leading analyst at Mobile Research Group Eldar Murtasin, “DDos attacks are business instruments for competition on the net, which is worth pennies.” The expert says that media sites, which had been attacked, were not ready for an incident of the kind.
Hacker attacks failed site of the Echo of Moscow radio station, the Kommersant daily, as well as the Zhivoy Zhurnal and Slon.ru. Chief Editor of the Echo of Moscow Alexei Venediktov sid that the attacks’ objective was to affect flow of information referring the elections.