Cloudflare has intercepted a new record-breaking distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack that briefly peaked at 22.2 terabits per second (Tbps) and 10.6 billion packets per second (Bpps), highlighting the escalating scale and sophistication of volumetric cyberattacks targeting global infrastructure.
The incident occurred only weeks after Cloudflare announced it had mitigated an 11.5 Tbps attack, then considered the largest publicly reported. Just months earlier, the company had reported neutralizing a 7.3 Tbps event. The rapid succession of increasingly powerful attacks underscores a trend of record-setting volumes emerging within short intervals, raising concerns among enterprises and service providers about the future resilience of internet infrastructure.
DDoS attacks aim to overwhelm networks and systems by flooding them with malicious traffic, often exhausting bandwidth, processing power, or device memory. In this case, although the attack lasted only 40 seconds, the volume of traffic generated was immense – comparable to one million 4K video streams running simultaneously. The packet rate of 10.6 Bpps equated to every individual on Earth refreshing more than one web page per second, straining load balancers, firewalls, and routers far beyond normal operating levels.
Cloudflare did not disclose attribution details, but the event comes as security researchers are linking recent mega-attacks to the AISURU botnet. Analysts at Qi’anxin, a Chinese cybersecurity firm, have reported that AISURU has infected over 300,000 devices worldwide, including IP cameras, DVRs, NVRs, and consumer routers. A significant spike in infections followed the compromise of Totolink’s router firmware update server in April 2025. The botnet also exploits vulnerabilities in Realtek chipsets and devices from vendors such as Linksys, Zyxel, D-Link, and T-Mobile.
Network Backbone Capacity
The rise of high-bandwidth, high-packet-rate DDoS campaigns presents a growing operational challenge for enterprises and providers of digital services. While backbone capacity has increased to accommodate ever-growing data demands, the packet intensity of these attacks can overwhelm even modern network defenses if not mitigated in real time. Cloudflare’s ability to absorb and deflect this latest event further reinforces the need for hyperscale, cloud-native protection against an evolving threat landscape.
The record attack adds to mounting evidence that attackers are leveraging more distributed and capable botnets, turning everyday connected devices into weapons against the very infrastructure that underpins the digital economy. For organizations, the incidents are a stark reminder that resilience planning must account not only for data throughput but also for packet-processing capacity, as adversaries appear intent on testing the limits of both.
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