Mean Servers offers DDoS or Distributed Denial of Service protection for clients that have subscribed to this premium service. If you are interested in obtaining DDoS protection to your Mean Servers' services, please open a ticket with the sales department. DDoS protection and mitigation does not come standard with any account but is available as a premium addon.
For those that do not subscribe to our DDoS protection and mitigation services, your account is automatically enrolled into the Mean Servers Network Defense System or just simply MeanNull. MeanNull is an in-house custom telemetry program that monitors traffic at all points of our network, from the edge, through the core, and all the way down to the distribution level. It also coordiantes with other networks enrolled in the original telemetry program MeanNull is based off of (designed originally for providers to block outgoing attacks, MeanNull was developed based loosely off the original project to protect against incoming and outgoing DDoS attacks), giving us insight into dangerous traffic before it reaches our network. MeanNull runs an algorithm that has been pre-programmed with the most common DDoS attacks that are rampant on the Internet today. When an attack begins that matches a signature or exceeds pre-set limits, MeanNull automatically goes into action and null routes the IP address being attacked.
By null routing the IP address being attacked, we are able to prevent excessive bandwidth overages, excessive loads for shared hosting and VPS clients, and prevent noise due to neighbors that might be running a service that attracts these types of attacks. This process is completely automated and MeanNull is able to capture DDoS attacks in the ramp-up stage, well before it reaches critical levels. This ensures clients not being attacked that they are protected and that their services remain up, even if their neighbor might be on the receiving end of an attack. In fact, most of the time, clients don't even have the slightest inclination that their neighbor is under attack as MeanNull detects attacks before they reach peak levels.
Upon being null routed by MeanNull, the client will be notified immediately by email that Mean Servers has on file in the client area. No further action is needed on the clients end if they are on the receiving end of the attack, the null route will automatically be lifted after a certain amount of time (determined by type of attack, details available in the email sent by MeanNull). Should the null route be lifted and the attack still be on going, MeanNull will reinstall the null route again, email the customer and try again to remove the null route once the new timer expires. All of this is completely automated requiring no intervention from staff or client.
MeanNull completely null routes the IP address being attacked, services are rendered unavailable if they are on the affected IP address. We are unable to lift MeanNull null routes that are installed due to on-going DDoS attacks or before your null route timer expires. If you are frequently on the receiving end of DDoS attacks, we recommend contacting the Mean Servers Sales Department to get on a proper DDoS mitigation plan as MeanNull is designed to be a last line of defense. Clients that are just hosting web sites and not any game servers or other services should check out CloudFlare, a free DDoS mitigation proxy service compatible with all of Mean Servers' services.
Can you see the inner workings of MeanNull? Unfortunately, that's part of our secret sauce and not available to the public ;-)
