Beginning in September 2021, aggressive threat actors have targeted multiple Voice-over-IP (VoIP) communication providers with a campaign of high-impact DDoS extortion attacks. These attacks incorporate a range of UDP reflection/amplification and application-level DDoS attack vectors which have disrupted VoIP services for organizations unprepared to mitigate the attacks.

What is happening? The current DNS is unnecessarily slow and inefficient because of efforts to accommodate a few DNS systems that are not in compliance with DNS standards established two decades ago. To ensure further sustainability of the system it is time to end these accommodations and remediate the non-compliant systems. This change will make most DNS operations slightly more efficient, and also allow operators to deploy new functionality, including new mechanisms to protect against DDoS attacks.

We’ve all been there. You’re relaxing at home, minding your own business, when suddenly you receive a call from a number you don’t recognize. You let it ring a few times, unsure if you want to pick up, but eventually shrug and hit Accept. And instead of another human, you hear what appears to be a prerecorded message about something you likely don’t care about. In some cases, the message isn’t even prerecorded — it’s generated on-the-fly using text-to-speech technology.