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A huge distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack in March brought down the voice-over-IP call processing supplied by TelePacific Communications (News - Alert) to thousands of its customers.

According to a recent analysis of VoIP security in NetworkWorld, this, as you might guess, prompted “a turning point for the local-exchange services provider in its thinking about security.”

The attack disrupted service for a number of days in late March, costing the company hundreds of thousands of dollars, according to Don Poe, vice president of network engineering at TelePacific Communications, which provides the VoIP "Smart Voice" service to thousands of customers.

It’s not clear yet exactly who was behind the attack, but as NetworkWorld noted, the attack swamped their capability, denying customers the ability to call. As the journal noted, “botnets, cloud computing may be fueling attacks against VoIP.”

According to Poe, much of the DDoS attack streams appeared to originate from China, but there was no extortion threat accompanying the DDoS flood.

But it was a good kick in the pants for TelePacific, and NetworkWorld reported that they “turned to a number of firms, including Acme Packet (News - Alert) and Arbor Networks, for help in security and network analysis.”

They installed Arbor's PeakFlow anti-DDoS equipment, which helps but doesn’t completely solve the problems. Stacy Arruda, a supervisory special agent and cybercrime supervisor at the FBI, said commonly, “the goal for the attacker appears to be stealing information of value through the incident,” according to NetworkWorld.

One place where hackers are ahead of the white hats in the IT community, according to Patrick Gray, principal security strategist at Cisco (News - Alert), is that the IT community “doesn't talk among itself enough about the serious problems occurring in terms of DDoS and other security events,” unlike hackers, who talk to each other all day long."

Part of it is the understandable reticence to admit that you’ve just suffered a huge attack, of course, but it doesn’t help the overall situation. Besides, you’re not the only one who needs help. "DDoS attacks and SYN floods are extraordinarily common today," Stacy Griggs, senior director at Cbeyond (News - Alert) Cloud Services, a division of Cbeyond Communications, told NetworkWorld.

So take heart – and talk to someone. Chances are they’ve been hit too, and may be able to help.