Denial of Service (DoS)

Denial of Service is any attack that disrupts the availability of a network or service. Classic DoS uses a single source; DDoS uses many. Telecom-specific DoS targets include SS7 and Diameter signalling, GTP user plane, SIP servers, DNS resolvers, and 5G control-plane interfaces. Defences combine upstream scrubbing, rate limiting, and protocol-aware filtering.

Categories: SignalingThreats and AttacksProtocols and Standards

Denial of Service (DoS) in context

Signaling protocols carry the control-plane messages that set up calls, register subscribers and route SMS. SS7, Diameter, GTP-C and SIP are the four dominant families, and interconnect exposure of any of them is treated by GSMA as top-tier telecom risk.

Telecom threats range from opportunistic SMS phishing and SIM swap to nation-state grade location tracking. The common thread is that most attacks exploit the inherited trust model of legacy signaling protocols.

To place Denial of Service (DoS) in the wider telecom-security picture, review Attack Surface Mapping, DDoS, Anomaly Detection, BGP, CAMARA Project and Charging System — each entry cross-references back to this page so you can walk the topic in either direction.

Related terms

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