A DDoS attack is one of the most common ways a perfectly healthy server gets knocked offline — and it has nothing to do with hacking in. The attacker simply drowns your server in so much junk traffic that legitimate visitors can no longer reach it. Here is what that means and why it matters even if you are not a household name.
How a DDoS attack works
DDoS stands for Distributed Denial of Service. "Distributed" because the traffic comes from many sources at once — often a botnet of thousands of compromised devices. "Denial of service" because the goal is to make your service unavailable. The flood saturates your bandwidth or exhausts your server's resources, and everything grinds to a halt.
The main types
- Volumetric attacks — raw bandwidth floods (measured in Gbps or Tbps) that clog your network pipe.
- Protocol attacks — abuse of how connections are set up (e.g. SYN floods) to exhaust server resources.
- Application-layer attacks — slower, sneakier floods of seemingly real requests that overwhelm your app.
"But I'm too small to be a target"
This is the most dangerous assumption. Plenty of attacks are not strategic — they hit game servers over in-game grudges, VPNs and small forums over disputes, or random IPs caught in a wider sweep. Attack tools are cheap and easy to rent, so the barrier to launching one is low. If your server is online, it can be targeted.
What real DDoS protection looks like
Good protection works upstream — attack traffic is detected and filtered out on the network before it ever reaches your server, so your VPS keeps serving real users. The key qualities to look for:
- Always-on, automatic mitigation — no waiting for you to notice and flip a switch.
- High capacity — enough headroom to absorb large volumetric attacks.
- Included, not an upsell — protection you only get on a pricey add-on is protection you will not have when you need it.
The bottom line
Yes, you need it — and it should not cost extra. Every Volt Serv VPS and dedicated server includes free DDoS protection on all plans. Pair it with good server hygiene (see our security checklist), and you have covered both the flood at the door and the locks inside. Running a game server? This matters even more.