Brussels, December 12, 2024 —Europol’s PowerOFF dismantled 27 DDoS platforms, arrested key figures, and revealed critical cybersecurity flaws, marking a major milestone in cybercrime prevention.
In a groundbreaking operation dubbed PowerOFF,” Europol has dismantled 27 DDoS (Distributed Denial-of-Service) attack platforms across 15 countries, striking a major blow to global cybercrime.
This multi-year crackdown saw the arrest of three platform administrators in France and Germany, while over 300 users of the illicit services face legal scrutiny.
These booter” and stresser” platforms, including zdstresser.net and orbitalstress.net, provided paid services to launch devastating cyberattacks on websites and web-based services. Europol stated:
These platforms were not just tools for hackers but weapons of economic and ideological warfare.
The operation highlighted glaring vulnerabilities in global cybersecurity. A recent Breaking WAF” flaw revealed how misconfigured CDN/WAF systems could enable DDoS attacks, exposing a critical weakness in enterprise environments.
Cybersecurity expert Zafran Research noted:
The dual functionality of modern WAF providers has created a blindspot, leaving many organizations vulnerable.
Participating nations, including the U.S., UK, Germany, and Japan, united to target these networks, further emphasizing the global nature of the threat. The action comes on the heels of a record-breaking surge in DDoS activity during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, where Cloudflare mitigated 6.5% of global traffic flagged as malicious.
The gambling and finance sectors were hardest hit, underscoring the financial and societal damage caused by such attacks.
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