A distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack is carried out in two stages. First, a virus must be spread to multiple computers using the standard methods for doing so. Once that is complete, a central control computer issues a command for all the infected computers to begin the attack. At this point, all the computers begin simultaneously requesting data from the target in large amounts. This blocks other systems from being able to communicate with the targeted server, effectively taking it offline. This is not the first time the Wikileaks has been the victim of such an attack, although they did seem to be more vulnerable this time around.
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