Japan’s largest telco NTT Docomo disrupted by DDoS attack

LovabledanielsJanuary 3, 202586 Views

Japanese telecoms giant NTT Docomo hit with a cyberattack
Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack affected services for 12 hours
Telecoms firms are being increasingly targeted by cybercriminals

NTT Docomo, the largest mobile carrier in Japan, has reported it has been hit with a cyberattack which targeted its systems by flooding networks with traffic from multiple sources, rendering its services unavailable.

The Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack hit on systems on Janaury 2, and services were down for roughly 12 hours.

The company has over 90 million subscribers, and users were left without access to the firm’s website, as well as news platforms and mobile payment systems – but core communication and mobile services remained unaffected.

Telco targets

“From around 5:27 a.m. on January 2, 2025, some services, including the goo portal and NTT Docomo services, became difficult to access. Access was restored at 4:10 p.m., although updates to some content may still be delayed. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused,” the company confirmed in a statement.

The telco giant has not yet confirmed who it believes was behind the attack, but there is speculation it may have come from a ransomware group – potentially Randomwed.Vc – who were behind an attack against NTT back in September 2023.

This is the latest in a string of attacks against telecommunications firms, including 9 major US firms, which were targeted by Chinese state-sponsored group Salt Typhoon – who were reportedly targeting high-level targets within the US Treasury Department.

Japanese firms are also frequent targets for cyberattacks, with Casio, Japan Airlines, and Fujitsu all hit in 2024, alongside Japan’s largest port – which suffered a ransomware attack in July causing severe disruption.

DDoS attacks rose by 30% in 2024, and were increasingly politically-motivated, targeting critical infrastructure, government services, and utilities across the globe. These attacks caused widespread disruptions, with 75% of newly established networks involved in DDoS attacks within the first 42 days of inception.

Via The Record