Systems and methods for detecting and preventing flooding attacks in a network environment

• US 8,917,725 B2
• Filed: 11/07/2012
• Issued: 12/23/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 07/06/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Fortinet Inc.
• Original Assignee: Fortinet Inc.
• Inventors: Wei, Shaohong, Duan, Gang, Chen, Zhongqiang, Xie, Bing
• Primary Examiner(s): Jiang, Charles C.
• Assistant Examiner(s): KAMARA, MOHAMED A
• Application Number:
  US13/670,585
• Publication Number:
  US 20130198839A1
• Time in Patent Office: 776 Days
• Field of Search: 370229-230, 370/232, 370/252, 726/1, 726/3, 726 11- 14, 726 22- 23, 726 26- 30, 709223-225, 709/230, 709/232, 709245-246
• US Class Current: 370/392
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/1835 Buffer management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2463/143 Denial of service attacks involving systematic or selective dropping of packets
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/28 Restricting access to network management systems or functions, e.g. using authorisation function to access network configuration
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/16 Threshold monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0236 Filtering by address, protocol, port number or service, e.g. IP-address or URL
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/14 for detecting or protecting against malicious traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1408 by monitoring network traffic monitoring network traffic per se H04L43/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1416 Event detection, e.g. attack signature detection
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1458 Denial of Service
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1466 Active attacks involving interception, injection, modification, spoofing of data unit addresses, e.g. hijacking, packet injection or TCP sequence number attacks

Abstract

A method for processing network traffic data includes receiving a packet, and determining whether the packet is a previously dropped packet that is being retransmitted. A method for processing network traffic content includes receiving a plurality of headers, the plurality of headers having respective first field values, and determining whether the first field values of the respective headers form a first prescribed pattern. A method for processing network traffic content includes receiving a plurality of packets, and determining an existence of a flooding attack without tracking each of the plurality of packets with a SYN bit.

Claims

1. A method for processing network traffic content, comprising:

receiving, via a network communication interface, a packet associated with a new concurrent network traffic session;

identifying one or more Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of the new concurrent network traffic session;

determining a number of concurrent sessions associated with at least one of the one or more IP address associated with the new concurrent network traffic session;

identifying a concurrent IP address session threshold that is IP address, time of day the received packet was created, and packet type specific based on a type of the received packet, a current time of day, and at least one of the one or more IP addresses associated with the new concurrent network traffic session;

when the number of concurrent sessions associated with the at least one of the one or more IP addresses associated with the new concurrent network traffic session is greater than the identified concurrent IP address session threshold, performing flooding attack mitigation processing.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the flooding attack mitigation processing includes dropping all packets associated with the new concurrent network traffic session.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the flooding attack mitigation processing includes dropping all packets associated with the at least one IP address.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein:

identifying the one or more IP addresses of the new concurrent network traffic session further includes identifying a packet-type of the received packet;

determining a number of concurrent sessions associated with at least one of the one or more IP address associated with the new concurrent network traffic session includes determining a number of concurrent sessions of a type of network traffic sessions identified by the identified packet type; and

the concurrent IP address session threshold is network traffic session-type specific.

5. A system, comprising:

a processor;

a communication interface for communicating over a network;

a memory device including instructions stored thereon which when executed by the processor, cause the system to;

receive, via the communication interface, a packet associated with a new concurrent network traffic session;

identify one or more Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of the new concurrent network traffic session;

identify a concurrent IP address session threshold that is IP address, time of day, and packet type specific based on a type of the received packet, a current time of day the received packet was created, and at least one of the one or more IP addresses associated with the new concurrent network traffic session;

determine a number of concurrent sessions associated with at least one of the one or more IP address associated with the new concurrent network traffic session;

when the number of concurrent sessions associated with the at least one of the one or more IP addresses associated with the new concurrent network traffic session is greater than the concurrent IP address session threshold, perform flooding attack mitigation processing.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the flooding attack mitigation processing includes dropping all packets associated with the new concurrent network traffic session.

7. The system of claim 5, wherein the flooding attack mitigation processing includes dropping all packets associated with the at least one IP address.

8. The system of claim 5, wherein:

identifying the one or more IP addresses of the new concurrent network traffic session further includes identifying a packet-type of the received packet;

determining a number of concurrent sessions associated with at least one of the one or more IP address associated with the new concurrent network traffic session includes determining a number of concurrent sessions of a type of network traffic sessions identified by the identified packet type; and

the concurrent IP address session threshold is network traffic session-type specific.

9. A computer-readable storage device including a set of instructions stored thereon which when executed by a processor of a computer cause the computer to:

receive, via a network communication interface, a packet associated with a new concurrent network traffic session;

identify one or more Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of the new concurrent network traffic session;

determine a number of concurrent sessions associated with at least one of the one or more IP address associated with the new concurrent network traffic session;

identify a concurrent IP address session threshold that is IP address, time of day the received packet was created, and packet type specific based on a type of the received packet, a current time of day, and at least one of the one or more IP addresses associated with the new concurrent network traffic session;

when the number of concurrent sessions associated with the at least one of the one or more IP addresses associated with the new concurrent network traffic session is greater than the concurrent IP address session threshold, perform flooding attack mitigation processing.

10. The computer-readable storage device of claim 9, wherein the flooding attack mitigation processing includes dropping all packets associated with the new concurrent network traffic session.

11. The computer-readable storage device of claim 9, wherein the flooding attack mitigation processing includes dropping all packets associated with the at least one IP address.

12. The computer-readable storage device of claim 9, wherein:

identifying the one or more IP addresses of the new concurrent network traffic session further includes identifying a packet-type of the received packet;

determining a number of concurrent sessions associated with at least one of the one or more IP address associated with the new concurrent network traffic session includes determining a number of concurrent sessions of a type of network traffic sessions identified by the identified packet type; and

the concurrent IP address session threshold is network traffic session-type specific.