Denial of Service (DoS)

A Denial of Service (DoS) attack is when a cybercriminal overwhelms a website or online service with excessive internet traffic, making it unavailable to legitimate users. Think of it as flooding a store’s phone line so that real customers cannot get through. The goal is to disrupt normal operations, either for financial gain, protest, or to cause harm. These attacks can be simple or complex, involving many computers (botnets) working together. The result is a website that becomes slow or completely unusable until the attack ends or defensive measures are taken.