Andrew Lentvorski wrote:
> Neil Schneider wrote:
>
>> How many backbone routers are there? How many security
>> vulnerabilities
>> have been reported for Cisco IOS? Take out the routers and root
>> servers and the network will fall to it's knees.
>
> That's the big one from the software side. If you take out IOS on
> routers, you have done the equivalent of taking out Microsoft on
> computers.
>
> Taking out DNS won't stop the internet--everything communicates via IP
> underneath. Everybody would just switch to IP numbers until an
> alternative came up. Given the number of characters in some of these
> domains, IP numbers would be an improvement.
For most end users I encounter if the DNS fails "The Internet Is Down!"
> The big things:
>
> 1) Physical links--90+% of Internet traffic in North America probably
> passes through a small number of optic fiber bundles. Backhoe failure
> is a wonderful way to kill traffic.
Yep, there's an apocryphol story about a bum building a fire under a
bridge for warmth and taking out a big chunk of east coast traffic by
frying the fiber.
> 2) Exchange points--Does the vast majority of Internet traffic still
> go
> through the MAEs--MAE East, Central, and West?
Though the traffic through MAE West is huge, a lot of traffic bypasses
and transits through peering points that different "carriers" have set
up. Damage the routers in these "hotels" and you could remove a large
chunk of traffic off the net.
> 3) Router infrastructure--Compromising IOS would kill all the core
> routers. Monocultures suck.
>
> 4) Traffic overload--A giant Windows botnet that does nothing but send
> bogus traffic to all the non-botnet machines on the net.
Kind of a DOS for the entire world? That would be interesting. But
they would only have to target specific points in order to bring
things to a crawl.
> 5) DNS--wouldn't take it down, but included for completeness
>
> Number 3 is the most dangerous. Number 4 is the most probable.
> Number
> 5 is the only one easily fixed.
--
Neil Schneider pacneil_at_linuxgeek_dot_net
http://www.paccomp.com
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