DDOS attacks are real, and Blizzard isn't doing anything about it

This is a console issue (primarily Xbox) and has nothing to do with Blizzard. It is out of their control.

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They could try to raise it to Microsoft though.

But yeah, the power is still in Microsoft.

You used to see it a lot in Trials on Destiny if you smoked the enemy team, it started to get kind of bad in Red Dead Online if you got the best of a posse of griefers, that sort of thing.
This right here, what amounts to a surgical strike to take out an enemy supp in order to win an OW match, that sounds pretty next level compared to what you usually hear.

Yeah but I’m not sure if any action would be taken. Unfortunately

That seems about right. idk how xbox live works but fi it is a microsoft maintained feature not related to the game the attacker can just get your ip from it and spam you with request to make your connection lag.

Hey everyone, looks like you all decided to invoke me so here I am. Here is everything I know about the Xbox DDoSing issue and why it is a problem only related to Xbox and really has nothing to do with Overwatch. This problem has been known to affect multiple games (not just Overwatch). It is related to the system party chat feature which is a peer-to-peer service which is why your IP address can be exposed. Blizzard Technical Support Representative Drakuloth has posted full details which I will copy here:

Hey all,

I wanted to take some time here to talk about what a DDoS attack is and is not, since there seems to be some misunderstanding here in this thread. I’m also going to provide some general tips to help with connection issues. This is going to be a somewhat long post because there are a few inaccurate things in this topic that I need to correct, so bear with me. I want to make sure I’m helping you all avoid making your IPs vulnerable to anybody who might do this sort of thing. Hopefully it helps anybody reading understand this all a bit better.

What is a Denial of Service attack and how does it work?

So let’s start with what a Denial of Service attack is. A Denial of Service attack happens when a person or organization floods a specific router with a bunch of requests by targeting its IP address. The router eventually becomes overwhelmed, resulting in connection issues for anybody who needs to use that router as long as the router is under attack. A Denial of Service attack is only a “Distributed Denial of Service” (DDoS) attack if it targets a router that affects many thousands of users. The fact that it targets a major internet router somewhere is what makes the attack “Distributed.” In the rare event that one of you are actually suffering a Denial of Service attack specifically, that is not a Distributed attack, it’s just a DoS attack. While mostly semantics, I thought that might be good to know for your personal information.

So they need my IP to do a Denial of Service Attack. How do they get it?

Without going into the actual process by which this is done (I don’t want to encourage any more people to do this, because it’s illegal), it starts by having a Peer to Peer connection with another person. I’m bringing this up specifically because it is impossible for someone to get your IP address from within Overwatch. We do not use any Peer to Peer connectivity in Overwatch - as both your game connections and Vivox go through our centralized servers.

Currently, some Party Chat on Xbox Live goes through Peer to Peer, but this is a problem that Microsoft is currently working on . Because Peer to Peer connections do not occur within Overwatch, your best chance at avoiding such an attack is to never join an Xbox Party Chat Request from someone you do not trust. If you only use Overwatch in game chat to communicate, you will not have your IP exposed, since all traffic goes through a centralized server.

I may have exposed my IP address and I think I’m being attacked. What do I do?

Please note that there is nothing that we can do to help you with a Denial of Service attack, because we have no control over your IP address. Similarly, if you are disconnecting from the game for any reason, we do not remove leaver penalties . If you’re regularly disconnecting, you need to troubleshoot the disconnections , and if you think you’re disconnecting due to a DoS attack, that means reaching out to your Internet Service Provider.

Since a DoS attack requires your IP address, the easiest way to fix it is to contact your ISP and ask them to change your IP address. Once they do this, the attacks should stop (unless you join a Peer to Peer service with someone and expose your IP address again.) With that in mind, if you continue to disconnect after changing your IP address, you were not experiencing a DoS attack. You’d want to do normal connection troubleshooting instead.

I hope this covers a bit about the situation and how you can avoid being DoSed, or fix situations where you’re in a position to be DoSed. Note that beyond providing this information, there’s nothing else we can do as support. If you run into any other issues, however, feel free to create a new topic about them.

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I mean why ddos a player on PC when you can just hack yourself to absurd levels? :man_shrugging:

Take this up with console makers then because its really only their fault for even allowing it to happen. Blizz can’t really prevent it unless you want to lose access to OW on your console.

That’s because on PC it’s impossible to get someone’s IP address to send them a ddos attack. Everything goes through Blizzard servers, so there’s no peer to peer even with their voice chat servers.

well just block the messages you get strangers so no one can DDos you , and don’t join xbox vc’s from the enemy team , those their ways to get your IP

Ok, because of the infrastructure and design of OW, DDOS attacks are uncommon. They’re more something that happens in peer to peer games. Client server games are less susceptible.

However, even if they were occurring, Blizzard couldn’t possibly do anything about them. They’re something that occurs on a fundamental network level above the game. It’s like if someone sent a goon over to unplug your router - it’s nothing to do with the game specifically, and nothing Blizzard could do would provide any solution to that. It’s fundamentally outside of their responsibilities to solve. The only thing they can do is make a client-server architecture and hide player IPs from each other and they did that.

DDoS and DoS differ by number of attacking computers. Simple DoS has just one computer - one of attacker - targeting victim’s router.

But DDoS has multiple attacking computers, that via virus or other means are made into attackers as well.

It’s possible to defend yourself against DoS, if your internet connection is stronger, than one of attacker. But DDoS attack can flood even connection of datacenter, which is multiple GBit/s.

Many beginner “hackers” try to DoS some major internet points, but they don’t succeed, as those points usually have serious protection measures.

As for Peer-to-Peer system being responsible - not exactly. If your console or PC were behind NAT, your real IP address isn’t visible, only shared address used by multiple people is, so attacking only you is problematic. But if your connection is direct(has “white” IP address), then yes, your real IP address is visible online and can be read.

OP description looks less than DoS and more like specifically targeting whatever ports Overwatch uses. Technically, if someone creates false “disconnect” pocket and sends it to server with IP address of victim, server cancels connection of victim.

Unfortunately, there is not much Blizzard can do against it - encryption would make game slower and increase ping.

Been a while since I’ve seen someone so completely wrong.

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Blizzard has no control or ability to do anything about you being DDoSed. It doesn’t even go though their network. This is 100% on your ISP. You contact your ISP. If there is a real DDoS happening to you they can see it and will try to stop it, trace it and maybe contact the proper law enforcement.

That or they just went full rage cheat and start raining down rockets at full auto from the heavens like a rabid and caffeinated weasel.

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That’s the thing - it’s not DDoS, so they won’t do anything about it.

Basically, if there are no lags before disconnect, it’s not DDoS type of attack, and ISP can’t even detect it.

Then they should send that message over to xbox support.

I am sure, that we won’t get proper answer from them or from Blizzard, but…does Overwatch server check, that disconnect request with certain IP address was actually sent from that IP address?

There is certain type of attack(think it’s called “spoofing”), that involves sending commands, as if they come from target of attack. Which can cause disconnects for seemingly no reason, as server “believes”, that you pressed “disconnect” button. While in reality, different PC created disconnect request, but put your IP address as “return” address.

I’m frustrated about a lot of what Blizzard is doing these days, but DDOS attacks (if accurate) isn’t even in their domain.

That’s not how the Internet works. It would always be the players IP that disconnects. Trust me when I say Blizzard can’t do anything about this.