DDoS mitigation market continues growth curve

Appliance sales up in 'quiet' Q3 as volume of attacks increase

The market for distributed denial of service (DDoS) prevention appliances continues to heat up as non-stop attacks plagued a wide variety of industries in Q3, according to Infonetics Research.

The analyst said the global DDoS prevention market rose six per cent sequentially to $89m (£54.5m) in Q3.

Arbor Networks headed the market with more than 50 per cent share, with Radware a distant second, Infonetics said. The former's launch of a hybrid cloud service, as well as web security vendor Akami's acquisition of specialist DDoS vendor Prolexic, bode well for the continued growth of the market, it added.

"Strong growth of DDoS prevention appliances continues in 2013 as non-stop attacks plague a wide variety of industries, and large enterprises and service providers look to protect their users and data from a new wave of sophisticated DDoS attacks," said Jeff Wilson, principal analyst for security at Infonetics Research.

"An increasing number of application-layer attacks, which older DDoS detection and mitigation infrastructure cannot identify and block, are forcing companies to make new investments in DDoS solutions.

Prolexic, which was this month acquired by Akami for $370m, claims the total number of DDoS attacks rose 58 per cent year on year in Q3, with the largest it mitigated an attack on a media firm peaking at 120Gbps. It noted that Q3 is usually a quiet quarter for DDoS attacks.

SMBs are increasingly a target as cybercriminals use DDoS attacks to distract their attention as part of a wider assault on the company, while research earlier this year found DDoS attacks can now be rented for $2 an hour.

Infonetics said the standalone DDoS prevention market will be affected by the availability of integrated DDoS mitigation solution in 2015.