DoS Methods – PDoS, Permanent DoS attacks

DoSA PDoS or permanent denial-of-service, also referred to as phlashing, is a severe attack that completely damage a system as a result of which the system’s reinstallation of hardware or replacement is required. A PDoS attack exploits the flaws of security which further permits the administration present far away on the hardware of the victim management interfaces, like printers, routers, or other hardware used for networking.

If you have any kind of iPhone or similar device, it’s very likely that you have hear or made the jailbreak process in order to be able to control your device better that the manufacter wants you to. After flashing the device hardware limitations and software limitations by replacing some ROM record, you are able to install not aproved apps, set the settings that the normal device is not able to do. All these functions made possible by jeilbreaking the phone are in a good way named PDoS. Permanent denial of service will change the hardware settings in the deep and closed ROM level and allow the hardware to do some new and maybe prohibited task that were limited by the manufacturer. In some other form, the PDoS will use the same technique to destroy the functionality of some hardware component in order to blemish the overall function of the device.

The PDoS is a kind of attack in which hardware is purely targeted and it does not require many resources. It’s a fast attack. Many mushroom hackers are attracted towards this method because of its features, and the potential that it holds for high probability of security exploits on Network Enabled Embedded Devices (NEEDs). A PDOS attack damages a system so badly that it requires replacement or reinstallation of hardware. Unlike the infamous distributed denial-of-service or short DDOS attack which is used to sabotage a service or Website or as a cover for malware delivery — PDOS is pure hardware sabotage.

An anecdote is saying that in the year 2008 at the EUSecWest Applied Security Conference in London an employee of Hewlett-Packard’s Systems Security Lab namely Rich Smith created a tool called PhlashDance in order to detect as well as demonstrate the vulnerabilities of PDoS.

One Response

  1. Tretsrast January 10, 2013

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