Ways to Protect Against DDoS Attacks for Webmasters

In this article, we focused on the precautions and tools that webmasters can use to protect their websites against DDoS attacks — especially those most relevant to individual and mid-sized site owners.

Most individual webmasters typically host their websites through shared or managed hosting providers. However, high-traffic websites often require dedicated servers. These sites, due to their greater revenue potential and competitive nature, are more likely to become targets of cyberattacks.

When a DDoS attack occurs, hosting providers usually offer limited support based on the customer’s service plan. But in the case of large-scale attacks, the responsibility of mitigation often falls directly on the website owner. That’s why webmasters must take proactive steps to ensure their websites remain online. Fortunately, there are a number of cost-effective tools and strategies that can help mitigate DDoS threats up to a certain level.

In this guide, we’ve outlined practical DDoS protection methods and tools geared primarily toward mid-sized corporate websites and individual webmasters managing high-traffic sites.

Before diving in, we also recommend checking out our other article, where we explain the types and mechanics of DDoS attacks  it will give you valuable background to better understand how to defend your site.

In 2024, DDoS attacks saw a significant global increase. Cloudflare reported blocking 21.3 million DDoS attacks throughout the year — a 53% rise compared to the previous year.

Additionally, according to Radware’s 2025 Global Threat Analysis Report, web-based DDoS attacks surged by 550%. The most frequently targeted sectors included government, finance, and entertainment.

The financial impact of these attacks was also substantial. According to Cybersecurity Ventures, the global cost of cybercrime reached $9.5 trillion in 2024.

Data from StormWall shows that DDoS attacks worldwide increased by 108% in 2024, with the average attack lasting 23 minutes. The countries responsible for the highest number of attacks were Russia and the United States.

Use a Reliable CDN and DDoS Protection Service is a powerful defense method that involves delivering your website through globally distributed servers while filtering incoming traffic to protect against DDoS attacks.

CDN (Content Delivery Network) providers like Cloudflare, Akamai, and Amazon CloudFront intercept requests through their own servers. This not only improves page load speed but also blocks potential attacks before they reach your origin server.

While many CDN services offer free plans, premium tiers are typically required for higher security and enterprise level protection, with pricing often based on monthly traffic volume.

Setup is usually as simple as pointing your domain to the CDN’s nameservers and configuring security settings.

This method is highly effective against most volumetric DDoS attackson its own. However, when combined with WAFs and traffic analysis tools, it becomes even more robust especially for defending against application-layer (Layer 7) attacks.

Implement a Web Application Firewall (WAF) is a security solution that analyzes incoming HTTP traffic to your website and blocks malicious requests, providing effective protection particularly against application-layer (Layer 7) DDoS attacks.

A WAF filters threats like SQL injection and XSS, as well as bot traffic and HTTP flood attacks, helping to reduce server load and prevent service disruptions.

Solutions from providers such as Cloudflare, AWS WAF, Sucuri, and Imperva are commonly available, often offered through monthly subscription models. Free versions are also available for smaller websites.

To use a WAF, DNS redirection or CDN integration is typically all that’s needed, and a webmaster with some technical knowledge can usually set it up without much trouble.

While a WAF is highly effective against Layer 7 attacks, it should be combined with firewalls, CDNs, and traffic analysis tools to ensure full protection against larger-scale volumetric threats.

Perform Traffic Analysis and Anomaly Detection is a security method focused on continuously monitoring network traffic to a website in order to identify unusual activities that deviate from normal behavior.

By analyzing metrics such as IP address density, connection frequency, packet sizes, and protocol types, the system can detect sudden spikes or suspicious patterns that may indicate a DDoS attack.

Tools commonly used for this type of analysis include Wireshark, NetFlow Analyzer, ntopng, Zabbix, and AI-powered platforms like Darktrace. Some of these are open-source and free, while enterprise-grade solutions with advanced features can be more expensive.

Implementation typically involves integrating with network devices or installing monitoring software on the server.

While this method is highly effective for early detection of attacks, it does not block them. That’s why it works best when combined with preventive solutions like firewalls, CDNs, and WAFs to provide complete protection.

Setting up real-time monitoring and alerting involves implementing a system that continuously monitors the online status and performance of a website or server, and sends instant notifications when issues such as downtime, slow responses, or error codes are detected.

This method helps detect DDoS attacks early and enables administrators to respond quickly. It’s easy to implement using tools like RobotAlp, UptimeKuma, or Pingdom, which can be set up within minutes. Alerts can be sent via email, SMS, or Slack.

Basic plans are usually free, but features like shorter check intervals, multi-location monitoring, or advanced reporting may require upgrading to a paid plan.

These systems do not block attacks; they only detect and notify. Forreal protection, they should be used alongside active defense tools like WAFs, CDNs, and firewalls.

Configure Firewalls and Rate Limiting is a basic security method used to filter incoming traffic to a web server based on predefined rules, blocking harmful or excessive requests.

Firewalls can block requests from specific IP addresses or restrict access to certain ports, while rate limiting controls the number of requests a user can make per second — helping prevent server overload.

These settings can typically be configured at the server level (such as Apache or NGINX), through web applications, or via CDN services like Cloudflare, AWS, and Google Cloud Armor.

Basic firewall and rate limiting features are available for free on many platforms, though more advanced and automated rules often require a paid plan.

This method is particularly effective against smaller-scale DDoS attacks, but it's not sufficient on its own against large, distributed attacks. For full protection, it should be used in combination with other security layers.

Use Redundant Infrastructure (Load Balancing) is a method that distributes incoming traffic across multiple servers to balance the load and prevent any single server from becoming overwhelmed.

This setup not only improves performance but also enhances resilience during high-traffic events like DDoS attacks — since the load can be shifted to other servers instead of causing a single point of failure.

Load balancing can be implemented using physical hardware or software/cloud-based solutions such as NGINX, HAProxy, or AWS Elastic Load Balancer. Costs vary depending on the infrastructure and scale — open-source tools can be cost-effective for smallprojects, while larger systems may require paid cloud services.

While this method is very effective for ensuring high availability and uninterrupted service, it should be combined with other security layers like firewalls, WAFs, and traffic monitoring to prevent attacks from spreading across the entire infrastructure.

Keep Everything Up to Date refers to regularly updating all the software components that power your website  including the operating system, server software, CMS platforms (like WordPress or Joomla), plugins, and security patches.

While DDoS attacks don’t typically exploit software vulnerabilities directly, outdated systems can be weakened and made more vulnerable to exploitation, making it easier for attackers to cause damage.

This practice is usually cost-free, though large-scale systems may incur costs if professional maintenance or management services are involved.

It’s simple to implement: regularly monitor and apply security updates released by software developers.

Although this method won’t prevent DDoS attacks on its own, it significantly increases your system’s overall resilience by eliminating weaknesses that attackers could otherwise exploit. When combined with other security layers, it strengthens your defense posture.

Protect Your DNS is a security measure aimed at defending the DNS infrastructure that connects your website's domain name to the internet from DDoS attacks.

Attacks targeting DNS servers can render your website completely inaccessible, so it's crucial to ensure that your DNS service is secure, fast, and redundant.

To achieve this, you can use DDoS-protected DNS providers such as Cloudflare, Google Cloud DNS, or Amazon Route 53. These services often offer free plans for basic use, while high-performanceor enterprise solutions may require a paid subscription.

Setup is simple: point your domain to the DNS provider and manage your DNS records through their dashboard.

While DNS protection alone is not enough to stop all DDoS attacks, it helps mitigate DNS-targeted threats, keeps your website online longer, and ensures that other layers of defense can function properly.

DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks often make websites appear accessible due to CDN or browser caching, even though the database connections in the background might be disrupted without notice. In such scenarios, a "cache buster" monitoring method, which bypasses caches and directly tests server and database availability, becomes essential. This technique adds unique query parameters

Robotalp provides advanced  monitoring capabilities, allowing you to accurately assess your website’s real-time status during DDoS attacks. By avoiding cached responses, it quickly identifies database connection issues, enabling prompt intervention. Additionally, Robotalp’s customized URLs and HTTP  provide precise insights into your website's true accessibility.