Threat Bulletin 1297: UDP reflection (DNS) against a news publisher platform in the Middle East

On Wednesday 11 February 2026 at 04:44 UTC, a UDP reflection (DNS) targeted a news publisher customer in the Middle East. The attack peaked at 204.8 Gbps and lasted 180 minutes. Traffic originated from 2253 autonomous systems in 63 countries, predominantly mobile carrier ranges.

Vector UDP reflection (DNS)
Peak 204.8 Gbps
Duration 180 min
Time to mitigation 0.780 s
Attack traffic reaching origin 0.002%
Legitimate traffic challenged 0.35%

Timeline

The attack was preceded by a ransom note demanding payment in Monero. Edge packet filters identified the flood by source port and payload signature and dropped it at line rate across 14 points of presence.

What the customer saw

A brief increase in p99 latency of 22 ms during the first minute, then normal service.

Recommendations

  • Review allow-listed partner ranges quarterly.
  • Keep origin IPs out of public DNS history.
  • Add a dedicated rate limit for the targeted route.

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