What Is an IP Booter?

An IP booter, also known as a “booter service,” is an on-demand distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack service that enterprising cybercriminals offer to bring down websites and networks. As such, it also came to be known as a “DDoS booter.” It obscures the identity of the attacking server by using proxy servers that reroute the attackers’ connection while masking their IP address.

It is a cybercrime tool often confused with an IP stresser.

Read More about an IP Booter

Peddlers of the service often use the software-as-a-service (SaaS) business model. As such, it often comes with email support and even YouTube tutorials.

How Does an IP Booter Differ from an IP Stresser ?

A booter is the opposite of a stresser. While they function the same way and are often used interchangeably, one is illegal, and the other isn’t.

Cybercriminals and other threat actors use booters to attack target websites and networks. Cybersecurity professionals, on the other hand, use IP stressers or DDoS stressers to defend against DDoS attacks enabled by booters.

Are IP Booters and Botnets the Same Thing?

A botnet is a group of computers cyber attackers use to take a target system or network offline through a DDoS attack without their owners’ knowledge or consent. A booter, meanwhile, doesn’t require hacking tons of devices to launch a DDoS attack since the service is already backed by a server with the capacity to do so on its own.

What Kinds of Attacks Can an IP Booter Cause?

The service can instigate two major types of attacks—amplification and reflection attacks.

What Is an Amplification Attack?

In this kind of attack, an infected computer starts communicating with a server. The requests and data it generates are immense. As the communication keeps going, the server can’t handle the amount of data and eventually crashes.

What Is a Reflection Attack?

In this attack type, hackers use IP spoofing to send a request to a third party. That third party sends a response back to the victim over and over until the receiver can handle no more and crashes.

While threat actors may use booters to launch either an amplification or a reflection attack, they often succeed when they use both. How?

First, the attackers fake the target’s address and send a message to a third party. When the third party replies, the message goes to the target’s address. The reply is much bigger than the original message, amplifying the size of the attack.

How Can Users Avoid Becoming IP Booter Attack Victims?

While booter attacks are hard to trace since the services use frontend websites for payment and obtaining instructions, they are preventable. More often than not, no identifiable connection can be made to the backend initiating the actual attacks. As such, criminal intent is hard to prove.

Here are some best practices.

Organizations should use firewalls to protect their servers at the edge so they can’t get overwhelmed by invalid traffic. They can also keep hackers from infiltrating their networks.
They should employ antimalware. Running such programs regularly and performing manual scans at least once a week for deep cleaning is also advisable. The solutions can remove malware from devices.
Companies should watch network logs carefully. Endless pings a system can’t resolve should be blocked immediately.
They should apply security patches and updates regularly and diligently to address vulnerabilities in software and hardware that attackers can exploit or lead to a data breach.
Organizations should enforce rate-limiting techniques to limit the number of requests a certain IP address can make within a specific time frame. That will help prevent web resources from getting overwhelmed.
They may use content delivery networks (CDNs) to distribute traffic across multiple servers, minimizing attackers’ ability to target a single system with a booter.

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As mentioned earlier, booters are illegal and pose various risks to businesses. It’s always best to distinguish, therefore, between booters and stressers if your organization decides to use the technology to prevent DDoS attacks.

Key Takeaways

An IP booter is an on-demand DDoS attack service enterprising cybercriminals offer to bring down websites and networks.
A booter is the opposite of an IP stresser. While they function the same way and are often used interchangeably, one (IP booter) is illegal and the other (IP stresser) isn’t.
Booters are used to launch amplification and reflection attacks.
Using firewalls, antimalware, and CDNs are just some of the ways to prevent booter attacks.