Cyber Attack Was “Malicious”; Homeland Security Monitoring As Twitter & Netflix Come Back Online
UPDATE, 1:48 PM: The White House has weighed in now, calling the cyber attack that has come in waves today and is far more wide-reaching than initially thought “a malicous” attack. The attack seemed to come in two waves, as Internet performance management company Dyn reported that the first one started about 7 AM this morning. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told reporters that the Department of Homeland Security was “monitoring the situation” but that “at this point I don’t have any information about who may be responsible for this malicious activity.”
Twitter, Netflix, Spotify, Disqus and PayPal have come back to life, but the attack affected servers across the country and seemed to be mainly focused on the U.S. market. Even Amazon was affected. The cause of the attack appears to be what is called “a denial of service” or DDS, which can happen when the service is overwhelmed with large amounts of fake traffic to push servers offline.
PREVIOUS, 9:36 AM: Twitter, Netflix, Amazon, Reddit, and Spotify were slowly coming back online after a reported cyber attack that knocked out service for a good portion of users on the East Coast and some on the West Coast. The service disruption is still continuing for some users. Other sites affected by the attack on the computer server infrastructure included SoundCloud, Disqus and PayPal.
The shutdown occurred a little after 7 AM ET when Internet performance management company Dyn suffered “a distributed denial of service.” The company that monitors and controls online infrastructure is headquartered in New Hampshire.
“Some Netflix members are experiencing intermittent service disruptions due to an attack on a DNS service provider, Dyn, ” said a Netflix spokeswoman. “We are working closely with our DNS vendors to mitigate the issue.”
Millions of users across the globe were affected as outages were also reported in Japan and in Europe. The issue is affecting both computer and phone apps. Stay tuned.
Related stories
'Dirk Gently' & 'Black Mirror' Season 3 Review: Brits Coming With Savory Treats
Netflix Emma Stone-Jonah Hill Series 'Maniac' From Cary Fukunaga Finds Writer
'The Ivory Game' Trailer: First Look At Netflix's Latest Leonardo DiCaprio-Produced Docu
Get more from Deadline.com: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Newsletter
