Are you worried about your website getting DDoS attacks? Recently, I heard one of the famous Indian Blogger’s websites was severely hit by DDoS attacks.
So, in this article, I will teach you how to protect your website from DDoS Attacks.
Table of Contents
Short information on DDoS Attack
A Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack is a malicious attempt to disrupt the normal functioning of a network, service, or website by overwhelming it with a flood of Internet traffic. In a DDoS attack, multiple compromised computers or devices, known as botnets, are coordinated to send a massive amount of traffic to a target, effectively overwhelming its resources and causing it to become inaccessible to legitimate users.
DDoS attacks can occur for various reasons:
Malicious intent: Attackers may target organizations, businesses, or individuals to cause disruption, damage reputation, or seek financial gain.
Revenge or activism: An individual or group may launch a DDoS attack as a form of retaliation or to voice their grievances against a specific target, such as a company or government entity.
Competition or sabotage: Rival companies or individuals may launch DDoS attacks to gain a competitive advantage by disrupting their target’s online services or rendering them unavailable.
Extortion: Attackers may threaten to launch DDoS attacks unless a target pays a ransom or meets certain demands.
Ideological reasons: Hacktivist groups or individuals with ideological motivations may employ DDoS attacks to promote their beliefs, protest against specific actions, or raise awareness about certain issues.
DDoS attacks exploit the limited resources of a target system, such as its bandwidth, processing power, or memory, by overwhelming it with a flood of traffic. This flood can be in the form of a high volume of incoming requests, excessive network packets, or other malicious data.
The sheer magnitude of the attack makes it difficult for the target system to differentiate between legitimate and malicious traffic, leading to service degradation or complete unavailability.
To mitigate the impact of DDoS attacks, organizations employ various defensive measures, such as traffic filtering, rate limiting, load balancing, and the use of specialized DDoS mitigation services or appliances.
How do I add DDoS protection to my website?
One of the easiest and best ways to protect your website from harmful attacks like DDoS is to use Cloudflare protection. Let’s go through the steps to add Cloudflare protection to your website.
First, log in to Cloudflare using your e-mail, and add your site. You can go with a free plan that provides unmetered DDoS protection.
Here you can see Cloudflare free plan offers unmetered DDoS protection that secures websites and applications while ensuring the performance of legitimate traffic is not compromised.
Once you add your website, Cloudflare will ask you to set up DNS, and other settings which you can do easily by following the instructions.
Cloudflare asks you to change domain nameservers pointing to them to activate your Cloudflare protection. For that, go to your existing domain provider or host and change the nameservers pointing to Cloudflare as shown in the screenshot below.
It takes some time for domain nameservers to propagate. Once it happens, you will see your website showing active status on the Cloudflare dashboard.
As Cloudflare starts protecting your website, you can now access various features including security, the most important one.
Cloudflare scans your website, and checks for firewall events, Bot Traffic, DDoS attacks, and other security credentials. In the security tab, you can apply various settings to protect your website from harmful attacks.
Here are some important settings:
#1 If you are already hit by DDoS or bot traffic, you can choose I’m Under Attack, and let Cloudflare impose stricter rules.
#2 In the bot section, turn on the Bot Fight Mode that allows Cloudflare to apply necessary rules to prevent bot traffic.
#3 In the events section, you’ll see all the firewall events on your website. If you see any abnormalities, you can apply rules to protect your website.
Here you can see one of my websites is constantly getting bot traffic from India. The same IP addresses are used to harm my website frequently. So, I have blocked the traffic from India. My target country is the United States, and I have no problem blocking Indian traffic.
However, if India is your target country, and you are getting bot traffic, you can apply other options like ‘JS Challenge’, ‘Captcha’, and so on.
In this way, you can twitch Cloudflare settings free of cost to protect your website from harmful activities, and attacks like DDoS.
Read our detailed guide on 3 amazing steps to secure your WordPress website.
Conclusion on ‘How do I add DDoS protection to my website?’
In conclusion, protecting your website from DDoS attacks is crucial in maintaining its availability and ensuring a smooth user experience. One effective solution to implement DDoS protection is by using Cloudflare. Cloudflare offers robust and comprehensive protection against various types of DDoS attacks, safeguarding your website and its resources.
By routing your website’s traffic through Cloudflare’s network, you can benefit from its extensive infrastructure and intelligent security measures. Cloudflare employs advanced traffic analysis algorithms to identify and filter out malicious traffic, allowing only legitimate requests to reach your website. This helps prevent your server from being overwhelmed and ensures that your website remains accessible to genuine users.
Cloudflare’s DDoS protection is capable of mitigating even the largest and most sophisticated attacks, thanks to its global network and the ability to absorb and distribute traffic across multiple data centers. They have a team of security experts constantly monitoring for emerging threats and updating their protection mechanisms to stay one step ahead of attackers.
Additionally, Cloudflare provides real-time analytics and detailed reports on DDoS attack attempts, allowing you to gain insights into the nature of attacks and take necessary precautions for future protection. With Cloudflare’s user-friendly interface, adding DDoS protection to your website is a relatively simple process that can be accomplished without extensive technical knowledge.
In today’s interconnected digital landscape, where DDoS attacks continue to pose a significant threat, it is essential to prioritize the security and availability of your website. By leveraging Cloudflare’s robust DDoS protection, you can fortify your online presence, enhance your website’s resilience, and ensure a seamless experience for your users, free from the disruptions caused by malicious attacks.
