# Is half the friggen internet down? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 21, 2016, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271 "2016-10-21T19:51:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/1 "2016-10-21T19:51:14Z")
Apparently, Twitter, CNN, Reddit, Pay pal…and several others are experiencing problems now. Has the war heated up between the Russian hackers now? :rolleyes: Is there a DOS attack underway? CNN is ignoring the problem too? Anyone else having problems accessing the internet? ---
**Author:** ![DinoR](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dinor/32/2821_2.png) [@DinoR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DinoR)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/2 "2016-10-21T20:03:52Z")
There’s been a distributed denial of service [attack](http://gizmodo.com/this-is-probably-why-half-the-internet-shut-down-today-1788062835) on a major DNS (Domain Name Server) host. It’s not just you. ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/3 "2016-10-21T21:23:27Z")
It’s not just you, but I’m in the Seattle area and Twitter is back up now, hooray. ---
**Author:** ![SeaDragonTattoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@SeaDragonTattoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeaDragonTattoo)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/4 "2016-10-21T21:40:40Z")
Someone I follow on Facebook posted this: Phillip DeFranco: > [@](#): > > If you can’t access some of your favorite sites right now, you aren’t alone. A DDos attack this morning has taken down Twitter, Soundcloud, Spotify, Netflix (the app still seems to work for now), Reddit, Disqus, and Paypal. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/5 "2016-10-21T22:06:35Z")
it’s gotta be the Russians helping Trump. They did the impossible, he can’t use his Twitter account. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2016, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/6 "2016-10-22T13:55:43Z")
The only problems I’ve had are on live-streaming sports sites – which are themselves of Russian origin. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2016, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/7 "2016-10-22T21:33:05Z")
What is the motivation for launching a massive ddos attack like this? Just for sport, to prove that you can? Is there any benefit or profit to those who do it? ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2016, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/8 "2016-10-23T21:39:51Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > What is the motivation for launching a massive ddos attack like this? Just for sport, to prove that you can? Is there any benefit or profit to those who do it? All sorts of reasons. 1. Just plain old anger. There are a _lot_ of people on the Internet completely overwhelmed with anger. They do things like this just to “get back” at specific or general targets. E.g., a security researcher reporting on such attacks got his website DDoSed a couple weeks ago. His web host kicked him off since they couldn’t handle it. Luckily, Google stepped in to host it. 2. As part of a larger scheme. Messing up a chunk of the Internet might provide a cover for other activity. E;.g., there have been several major “probes” against Internet infrastructure in recent weeks. Some suspect that this is to test out how the major players respond. A full blown major whoa-daddy attack is expected soon. (Making Friday’s look like nothing.) Perhaps timed for the election. If everybody is too busy putting out fires, they might not notice other things the attackers are doing. 3. Just to prove they can do it. The source code for one of these DDoS attacks was recently released online. Friday’s attacks used that. Expect more of this nonsense. ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2016, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/9 "2016-10-23T22:15:49Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > There are a _lot_ of people on the Internet completely overwhelmed with anger. They do things like this just to “get back” at specific or general targets. E.g., a security researcher reporting on such attacks got his website DDoSed a couple weeks ago. His web host kicked him off since they couldn’t handle it. Luckily, Google stepped in to host it. His name is Brian Krebs. He’s been fighting the internet trolls and script kiddies for years. Krebs says a security firm told him [the same code that took down his site last month was the same code that did the damage last Friday](https://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/10/hacked-cameras-dvrs-powered-todays-massive-internet-outage/). That source code has since been released into the wild so DDoS attacks this large could come from anywhere now. ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2016, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-half-the-friggen-internet-down/769271/10 "2016-10-24T13:13:25Z")
> [@SeaDragonTattoo](#): > > Phillip DeFranco: One ‘L’.