The Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) has issued an alert to U.S. businesses about a rise in extortion campaigns. In a typical incident, a business receives an e-mail threatening a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack to its website unless it pays a ransom. Businesses are warned against communicating directly with attackers and advised to use DDoS mitigation techniques instead.
Users and administrators are encouraged to review the IC3 Alert for details and US-CERT Security Tip ST04-015 for more information on DDoS attacks.