Financial services companies worldwide saw the number of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks more than double in the second half of 2024. A DDoS attack is a malicious attempt to disrupt a service by overwhelming it with a flood of internet traffic. In the same period, the total number of DDoS attacks globally grew by 17 percent.
According to global hosting and cloud services company Gcore, the financial services sector saw the most significant rise of any sector in the third and fourth quarters of 2024, with a rise of 117 percent. This marks a consistent overall increase in DDoS attacks quarter on quarter. While the third and fourth quarters of 2024 showed an increase of 17 percent, this represents a 56 percent rise over the same period in 2023.
Easy access to off-the-shelf attack tools and resources coupled with the development of sophisticated attack methods, which make DDoS attacks more difficult to detect and mitigate, is responsible for this dramatic rise. Growing geopolitical tensions and economic rivalries between nation-states are also driving up the sheer number of attacks worldwide. Organizations targeted can suffer considerable financial and reputational damage when a DDoS attack forces them to take their online services down, often for a significant period of time.
Attacks have become potentially more devastating
The attacks themselves have also become more potentially devastating and harder to defend against. In the second half of 2024, the largest record attack hit two trillion bits per second (Tbps), an increase of 0.3 Tbs on the largest attack recorded in the first half of the year.
“While a 0.3 Tbps increase may seem incremental, it represents a substantial jump in destructive potential. Terabit-level attacks can cripple even the most resilient systems, resulting in complete service outages, disruption of critical applications, and severe financial and reputational damage for the organizations targeted,” says Gcore.
Technology services platforms are also frequently targeted for their vast computational power, which attackers can exploit to intensify DDoS attacks or support other malicious operations. The extensive resources available within these environments make them an appealing target for cybercriminals looking to scale their attacks or conceal harmful activities.
According to Gcore: “Any disruption to technology services can have far-reaching consequences, affecting countless organizations that rely on their availability and performance. As a result, technology providers have become prime targets for cyber attackers seeking widespread operational disruption.”
Gcore’s twice-annual Radar report analyzes DDoS attack data observed across its global network, spanning six continents.
