The website reflects coalition’s joint efforts over the past two years
After working in relative silence for about two years, the national anti-DDoS coalition recently launched the website nomoreddos.org. This website is intended to keep interested parties informed about the coalition’s activities and provide neutral information about DDoS attacks. The national anti-DDoS coalition is a public-private partnership of sector organizations, (semi) governmental institutions and companies. They are developing a joint, country-wide approach to DDoS attacks, not only about mitigating DDoS attacks, but also recognizing patterns to prevent future attacks and sharing expertise and experience.
Evolving attacks increasingly difficult to mitigate
The anti-DDoS coalition was established after the large-scale DDoS attacks on financial and government institutions in early 2018 to improve the ability to recognize and mitigate DDoS attacks. The first ideas for the concept of a DDoS clearinghouse were developed early in 2018 by SIDN Labs, SURF and the University of Twente. Although all parties involved in the coalition independently provide or use their own DDoS mitigation, sharing knowledge and operational data about DDoS attacks has proven to be of great added value.
Octavia de Weerdt, managing director of Stichting Nationale Beheersorganisatie Internet Providers (NBIP), and the NaWas (The National Non-profit DDoS Mitigation Center): “The annual reports on this subject show that DDoS attacks continue to evolve. It is very difficult to anticipate this as a single organization. By combining knowledge, skills and resources, we can jointly combat DDoS attacks much more effectively. The aim is to develop a system in which we can jointly recognize and therefore prevent DDoS attacks at an early stage. The website we have now launched shows the current state of affairs, what we are working on and also provides technical information about our approach.”
Progress clearinghouse to follow on website
The DDoS clearinghouse is one of the most important projects of the coalition. It is a system that allows participants to measure the characteristics (fingerprints) of DDoS attacks they face and share this information with other coalition members.
“There is still a lot of work to be done before the clearinghouse becomes operational nationwide in 2021,” says Marco Doeland, CISO & Manager Risk Management of the Dutch Payments Association. “We started on a small scale, with 10 participants. That keeps it manageable, but at the same time we encounter enough complexity to get a good idea of what is needed for a national rollout. In addition to elaborating on legal and governance issues, we are also working on an initial version of the clearinghouse cookbook, an instruction manual for participating parties. We are also organizing DDoS exercises.”
The national anti-DDoS coalition will keep developing additional activities. Those who want to know more about the national anti-DDoS coalition can now visit the website: nomoreddos.org.
About the national anti-DDoS coalition
The national anti-DDoS coalition is a public-private consortium of 17 Dutch organizations from different sectors (including ISPs, banks, government institutions and law enforcement agencies) that wish to jointly combat DDoS attacks. Together they develop new, standardized ways to prevent or mitigate DDoS attacks. They do this by exchanging information, conducting research, experiments, simulations and joint projects. Some partners are also working on an European variant of the clearinghouse in the context of the CONCORDIA project.
Participants in the anti-DDoS coalition are Agentschap Telecom, Amsterdam Internet Exchange (AMS-IX), Belastingdienst, Betaalvereniging Nederland, De Nationale Politie, De Nederlandsche Bank, KPN, Vodafone Ziggo, Nationaal Cyber Security Centrum (NCSC), NL-IX, Stichting Digitale Infrastructuur Nederland (DINL), Stichting Internet Domeinregistratie Nederland (SIDN), Stichting Nationale Beheersorganisatie Internet Providers (NBIP) NaWas, SURF, Universiteit Twente and VNO-NCW.