Slammer Worm debrief

Sat, 07 Jun 2003 13:31:00 -0400
/technology

Wired’s Slammer Worm debrief is worth checking out for the awesome graphics courtesy of Akamai and Paul Boutin’s ability to evoke an image of a dying internet:

By 12:45 am, huge sections of the Internet began to wink out of existence. Net Access Corporation, one of the Northeast’s largest ISPs, sent out an early SOS: “Nearly half our ports are in delta alarm right now.” Up on the big screen, Maresh could see backbone carrier Level 3’s transcontinental chain of routers trying to find working paths to the rest of the world - and failing. Three hundred thousand cable modems in Portugal went dark, and South Korea fell right off the map: no cell phone or Internet service for 27 million people. Five of the Internet’s 13 root-name servers - hardened systems, all - succumbed to the squall of packets.