Yankee Group Prediction: A Denial-of-Service Attack Will Take a 4G Network Down

  

The Yankee Group issued their 2011 predictions, which they say "is destined to be a big year for 4G".

Prediction #5 is about the [lack] of security in the upcoming new networks: "Rabid mobile broadband demand and aggressive 4G rollout schedules will pressure operators to cut corners on security. This is dangerous and will cost operators dearly down the road. In 2011, a denial-of-service (DoS) attack will take down a 4G network, squandering the affected operator’s opportunity to grow revenue and steal share"

See "Yankee Group’s 2011 Predictions: 4G Fuels the Decade of Disruption 4G Fuels the Decade of Disruption" - here.

"With clean-up costs (including the network, IT, customer care,media relations, etc.), fewer new subscriptions and increased churn, the bill for this DoS outage will be a minimum of U.S.$10 million in the first month alone .. The winners include vendors like Arbor Networks and Radware that help operators address these issues. But equipment vendors like Alcatel-Lucent (ALU), Cisco, Ericsson and Huawei will also be called on to assist, as will their professional services organizations"

Some DPI/traffic management vendors also offer DDoS prevention functions, by detecting traffic anomalies and blocking the relevant packets. See examples from Allot, Procera and Sandvine