AT&T offers anti-DDoS service for SMBs

AT&T launched its DDoS Defense Service Monday aimed at helping small and midsize businesses mitigate malicious Internet attacks.

This is a much slimmed down version of AT&T’s Internet Protect anti-distributed denial of service (DoS) offering, which AT&T first launched in 2004. Internet Protect is a fully managed, proactive service based on Arbor Networks' PeakFlow SP security platform.

DDoS Defense is a self-managed service that costs less than a large enterprise Internet Protect deployment, AT&T says. The service lets smaller organizations keep up with the latest security offerings to thwart attacks.

AT&T would not offer specific pricing information but says DDoS Defense is available with no set-up fees and for a flat monthly fee. Customers will have to pay an additional mitigation charge when under attack, the carrier says.

There are no set-up fees because customers are using their own edge device to detect an attack. When an attack is detected a customer goes to the carrier’s DDoS Defense Portal to redirect traffic to a shared “scrubbing facility.” Here bad packets are separated from good packets, which are then sent to their original destination.

Currently DDoS Defense is available only in the United States. AT&T says it will make DDoS Defense available in 32 countries throughout Europe this summer. AT&T’s Internet Protect anti-DDoS security service is available in 50 countries today.

Level 3 (which acquired the service when it bought Broadwing Communications), Sprint and Verizon Business all offer anti-DDoS services.