Elon Musk-Donald Trump interview disrupted by cyber attack: What is DDoS attack?
By Vinaykumar Patil | First Published Aug 13, 2024, 11:48 AM ISTElon Musk's interview with Donald Trump on X was delayed by a DDoS attack, overwhelming the platform with excessive traffic. The attack disrupted the scheduled event, leading Musk to proceed with a limited audience at 8:30 PM ET, promising to share the unedited audio afterwards despite the setback.
Elon Musk's much-anticipated interview with Donald Trump was disrupted by a DDoS attack, as confirmed by Musk on X (formerly known as Twitter). The interview, originally scheduled for 8 PM ET, faced significant delays after the platform was targeted by this cyber assault, which compromised its functionality.
What is a DDoS attack?
Latest Videos
A Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack is a form of cyberattack that overwhelms websites and servers with excessive, errant traffic, exhausting an application’s resources. This leads to poor performance or even a total shutdown of the targeted site. These attacks can persist for hours or even days, resulting in multiple disruptions within a single incident.
"I'm more of a believer now..." Donald Trump recounts assassination bid in interview with Elon Musk
Microsoft explains that during a DDoS attack, numerous computers flood a single system with traffic, pushing out legitimate users and leading to delays or interruptions in service. In severe cases, hackers can infiltrate the system’s database and access sensitive information. DDoS attacks exploit security vulnerabilities and can target any publicly accessible endpoint on the internet.
The DDoS attack on X not only delayed the conversation between Musk and Trump but also demonstrated the vulnerability of even the most robust platforms to such coordinated assaults. Musk addressed the attack in a post, saying, "It seems there's a massive DDoS attack on X. We're working to stop it. In the worst case, we'll continue with fewer live listeners and share the conversation later."
There appears to be a massive DDOS attack on 𝕏. Working on shutting it down.
Worst case, we will proceed with a smaller number of live listeners and post the conversation later.
Earlier in the day, Musk had tested the platform with 8 million concurrent listeners in preparation for the interview. However, due to the DDoS attack, he announced that the interview would proceed at 8:30 PM ET with a limited audience. "We'll move forward with a smaller number of concurrent listeners at 8:30 ET and then share the unedited audio right afterwards," Musk confirmed in a follow-up post.
Despite the disruption, Musk remained committed to ensuring the interview would be available to the public, though with some inevitable delays.
We will proceed with the smaller number of concurrent listeners at 8:30 ET and then post the unedited audio immediately thereafter https://t.co/oxF8PsNHnZ
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk)
subscribe to Asianet Newsable WhatsApp channel by clicking here. For more reliable and latest news
subscribe to Asianet Newsable Telegram channel by clicking here.